


Ideal in His Grief

by furius



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Episode Related, Hell, M/M, Religious Themes & References
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-11
Updated: 2011-06-27
Packaged: 2017-10-20 19:16:34
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 24,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/216221
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/furius/pseuds/furius
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The story Castiel's descent into Hell for Dean Winchester's soul and his remaking and burial of Dean's mortal body, set Pre-Season 4.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

After the last battle, Michael's sword at rest, even when pursued by the most pious prayers, none of the remaining angels would explain the reason behind the chain of events. Those who survived had not asked the question of a cursed time: knowing that death was possible, how should they die, with dignity, in the absence of God?

The angels had not dared to voice something so close to blasphemy, but neither could they explain because they had tacitly condoned the answer, agreed to the victory.

-=-=

Castiel was falling, toward the dark ground and the deep earth until the only light remained was the twinkling behind his eyelids. When the numberless shadows saw him, a soldier very perfect in his strength, they fled.

Castiel was rising, upward in the high and pristine air, paying obeisance to the summons of heaven, the intonations of the herald of God in midst of revelation. When the angels saw him, chosen for a singular miracle, they averted their faces and whispered.

It took two thousand years for Castiel to tumble into the magnificent rudeness we call body: skin, sinew and muscle- distending and extending; voice, wings, and glory- shuttered and enclosed.

When Castiel passed the dead bodies of his brothers and sisters he was walking bipedal, one uncertain step at a time, as awkward as a man newly made and as resolved as an angel newly born. He trailed bloody footprints behind him, each glowing faintly and growing fainter the further in he went.

The Host withdrew, but Uriel turned his head and looked back. As the darkness swallowed the last glimpse of the pink and white figure, he suddenly wondered if an angel, even if hidden inside a body not yet born on earth, should have been allowed to walk into Hell. No angel had ever returned.

-=-=

The locks groaned and twisted closed.

Castiel was alone.

Outside where battles were fought, blood, broken wings and withered bones had concealed the smoothness of ebony, the sheen of jet and the shine of dark metal that had wrought the gates. The work was beautiful. Castiel had to turn away. A tinny thread of song passed through the bars, tethering him to Heaven and his purpose. With every step forwards, it stretched thinner.

He looked up. The curved sky shone yellow and amber, burnished like a shield of brass.

He stood in a courtyard paved with polished stones, each one warm and sticky against the bottom of his feet. The debris of the battles had already been cleared. Four footpaths led four directions: North, South, East, and West.

Castiel had neither compass nor map, only the quiet voice of his order. He closed his eyes and listened. It led him off the footpaths. He stumbled, crashing into a shrub devouring a small dead animal.

The shrub was bigger than him; each serrated leaf as big as his hand. It ignored Castiel trying to disentangle himself from its branches and continued chewing.

Castiel continued walking. It was getting easier. He swung his arms in opposite direction from his legs and stumbled less.

-=-=

The first imp to see Castiel was surprised. He had a pitchfork and a spear. He thought of the sweetness of baby flesh and licked his lips. It had been a long time since anyone was diverted from the crossroads. Scurrying, he sidled beside the child walking alone in Hell.

"Are you lost?" he asked. The child's eyes were closed. He could be blind, or some demonic offspring. The imp was wary, "Do you know where you are going?"

"No," Castiel said, "Yes, I am going to Dean Winchester."

The name meant nothing to the imp, already thinking of supper and a reward from Lilith; perhaps he could be transferred to a proper check-point, preferably one with more traffic. "Take my hand," he said, "I will lead you to Dean Winchester."

He reached for Castiel's hand. The skin was soft, but the imp had scarcely touched it when fire rushed upward from the ground and he began burning in place, held immobile in torment as he had been at first, a man newly damned.

Castiel left him.

-=-=

A sulfuric miasma permeated the air. Castiel did not know how long he walked. He did not thirst. He did not hunger. He did not tire, but there was a part of him that wearied of moving so slowly through time which flowed sluggish and thick it was as if he was not moving at all.

Even when he opened his eyes, there was nothing in Hell where he walked. Here was no substance, only vagaries, sketches of things half-formed, or in the midst of transformation. Even Castiel himself was not a matter complete. The angelic grace locked deep within him, obscured by the human form threatened to burst through the illusion. The voice in his head had faded to a mere presence, reassuring but unhelpful.

One day, he heard something like a note stretched long and endless, grating. Then the sound stuttered, grew abrupt.

Next came the words: "Help me, help me, come and help me."

The sound grew louder as he walked on until he was very close. It was a strange creature that was puddled on the ground, arms and legs amputated above the elbows and knees. The hairless head bled from the scalp, it had empty sockets for eyes, two small holes for nose, and the voice was hoarse.

"How can I help you?" he asked.

"Find my enemy, avenge me," cried the shape that had been human.

"What happened you?"

"I was beloved," lamented the creature, "then I gave birth to a son and the queen punished me. My son was thrown from the parapet and I, stripped, humiliated, suffered, choking on coal and excrement until I died. Will you avenge me?"

"How can I avenge you?" Castiel asked.

"Simply say you will. I hear your voice. You have a kind voice, and young. If you're a ghost, you would not be here. You're here because you want to. Now, say you will."

"I am sorry," Castiel said. "I am here for Dean Winchester."

"Is he a king? An emperor?"

"No, he is-"

"Help me, help me." The creature seemed to lunge forward and curl upon itself the same time. "Will no one help me?"

"I'm sorry," Castiel said, and he was sorry. The fierceness of his sorrow frightened him. Angels knew fear, if not pity, for it was from the fear of God they found their wisdom. Castiel, not quite angelic, could not bear looking at the creature anymore, the soul stamped with the torment of her last hours. He closed his eyes and ran.

-=-=

The lands of the pathless Hell stretched on, an endless ruin without horizon and Castiel had nothing except his newly discovered fear that jostled against his conviction to find Dean Winchester.

He had begun to speculate: what if he did not find him? what if he was too late? what if he failed?

The unthinkable scenarios were discomforting, for he thought of them and could not stop. Though he still knew his purpose the unshakable faith of the devout had never been required of angels. Their highest calling had been unwavering obedience to something so manifestly real that they had never needed to trust.

And so, since if the angel Castiel could not distrust god, Castiel did not trust himself.

The pale shades did not accost him. He encountered no more imps. He closed his eyes and listened constantly for the presence of heaven while running inexorably further inward into the depth of hell.

-=-=

He halted as land started rising. The incline would not be laborious, but he wondered if he had came to the limes where a man such as Dean Winchester might be held.

"Where do you think you are going?" It had been very long since he had heard a question.

"To see Dean Winchester," he replied evenly.

"Really?" The demon peered down at Castiel and wondered who would be worth such an offering. Castiel had no shirt on his back, no shoes on his feet, and yet was like a rock or a tree that lack all these things without nakedness. He was also very young, unblemished and unmarked. It had been thousands of years since such an offering was made. The demon had a mind to pay a visit upstairs to see the trade, "But why are you walking off the footpaths? The paths in Hell lead everywhere." There were many roads to Hell, after all: an unworthy intent, a false hope, a dirty thought. The demon knew all the trails and highways, but the soul in front of him was too young to be damned by them.

"Then Dean Winchester is in nowhere," Castiel answered simply.

The demon hmmphed and harrumphed and regarded Castiel again, more carefully. He detected nothing but a faint translucence in the skin as if the child had never seen the sun in earth but had grown and matured according to only nature without any travails of the world, "You are willing to go there to find him."

"I am willing," said Castiel.

The demon, alarmed, stepped back from him. Whatever purpose Castiel was here for, whoever Dean Winchester was, no common human sacrifice should be so willing in the shadowed parts of Hell.

"Why don't you open your eyes? Are you blind?" Carefully now, the demon stood aside, just in case. Castiel had eyes, he was sure. The eyelids had that delicate curve to them, and the dark lashes on the cheeks trembled even as he spoke.

"There is nothing to see here."

The demon laughed. "Very true, except Dean Winchester, right? He's the one you are here to see?"

"Yes, I will see him."

"Very good. Follow me. I will lead you to Nowhere, just call out Crowley if you can't hear my steps." So saying, Crowley turned and started walking. Castiel heard a rhythmic crunch that sounded like footsteps on gravel, or the crackling of distant gunfire.

-=-=

Castiel followed Crowley, he might say later in the court of Heaven, not because he followed Crowley, but merely because Crowley was moving in front of him. He would insist that he was doing all that his grace commanded.

In truth, he did not know. There was nothing that stopped him and Castiel had not yet learned to lie or learn that others may lie. Crowley seemed reassured and self-preserved in a way that even Castiel could not fail to notice. Though he was a creature of Hell and unmindful of how the air distorted his words, Crowley seemed to speak to himself. Most of his words were nonsensical, but occasionally he would pause, as if he was listening to a reply, then start again. Like Castiel, he made no conversation with anything they passed.

He spoke with Castiel only once more.

"If you look up, what do you see?"

"A shell." It was not ether, and did not compose anything Castiel knew as matter. But even as he answered, Castiel thought he misspoke; the grace inside him, curled into an awkward heap, ached sometimes, homesick.

"No, it is our sky," corrected Crowley. "As the sky is substance so this is. Above it lay the world. And as the world would call the sky a place of infinite regions so we could call the world." Castiel did not know what Crowley meant so he remained silent.

He wondered if Crowley knew what he was and whether it while discussing the sky, that he would fail his mission.

"I have to leave you here, now, not that I don't want to see this through," Crowley explained. "I suppose I will in the end, but duty's calling. I have been tarrying, avoiding the busybodies on roads -- have enough of them during the workday -- the comfort is encountering you of all things in all time. Keep walking forwards and keep your eyes closed otherwise you will just walk in circles. Got that?"

Castiel nodded. "Thank you," he said.

"Find him first and I call us even." With that, Crowley's gone and Castiel was alone again.

-=-=

Castiel found his way blocked by something wooden that was neither tree nor furniture. It was as if the earth itself had bulged upward, then grew gnarled and ringed, gravid with a malignant growth that distorted even dirt. The thin thread of song that had guided Castiel had worn so thin that he did not dare to go around it for fear of never finding his way back again. Also, he remembered what Crowley said.

"I am going to find Dean Winchester," he said, because he was, even if no one would answer. It was good to remind himself.

"Dean Winchester?" The voice came from somewhere above him, then he heard a rustling of pages, "We do have many Winchesters here."

Castiel's heart skipped a beat. "You do?"

"Not Dean Winchester," said the voice, "but those names are a dime a dozen. He may very well go by something different by now."

"I must find Dean Winchester," Castiel insisted, suddenly desperate. He did not know Dean Winchester by any other name.

"Come on, son, you look pretty enough. Innocent, too, I bet. So how did you end up here? Someone sold you? The oblation business must be doing better than I thought if someone as good as you end up coming for a human named Dean Winchester. It's not a very grand appellation, so he must be very wicked indeed, or have very wicked friends, which is it?"

"He is in Nowhere," Castiel said.

"Nowhere? Well, he must be special indeed. This is as nowhere as you get. Come on in, welcome in, if that is what you desire. We can't stop the likes of you. Better brace yourself."

"Why?"

"This is Hell my boy, and you're going to its heart."

"Hell has no heart," Castiel murmured.

The blockade lifted. Castiel stepped forward and opened his eyes. At first, he thought he had merely encountered a wall of fire, then he realised that it was the light within him that had grown so intense that it was burning him inside out. Bright spots covered his vision, the pain was unlike anything he had known.

Somewhere in North America, in a comfortable house in a comfortable room with pillows strewn on the ground, James Novak was coming into being.

In Nowhere, everything went white. For the first time since his memory began, Castiel lost consciousness. He would never be the same.

Objects could not occupy the same space. The innocence of a child ensouled could only be at one place.

Thus, in the deepest realm in the darkest corner of Hell, Castiel began to grow up.


	2. Chapter 2

His bones lengthened, his skin expanded. The demarcation between childhood and adolescence may not be distinct and obvious in the world, where time was imprisoned by the linear strictures of eventualities but where free will was wild as any bird in a primordial forest.

In the supernatural places of the universe, time was eternal, unconfounded by mortality, but will was a thing whispered as if a shameful, erotic secret. Each place out of the world was part of a dominion, and each dominion had a lord who gave and took away what it would.

Castiel, wandering in the lonely places of Hell, could have been a child of any age, and as innocent as a child. His slight human form had allowed him to slip pass through the tired sentries at the gates undetected and the pearl of his soul -- temporarily borrowed as the vessel's body waited for its time -- had allowed him to walk safely through even the muddy places, for pearls did not dissolve in mud. So long as James Novak was unborn, so Castiel was innocent.

But James Novak was growing inside his mother's womb and his parents were waiting to see him. God had willed his existence since the beginning of time as he had Castiel's and their destinies.

When Castiel woke, he realised he was naked. At the moment, it did not shame him, for he had no concept of shame, but he noticed that it was a strange thing that his body went uncovered unlike every other thing around him.

The materials in Nowhere were countless and abominable, a confusion of inanimate and animate melded together.

There were clothes from every where and every time: mink coats and jeans, watches and gowns, dresses and armor, diamonds and scarves. They adorned, affixed to the bodies which remembered them. The souls that could not forget even in death the texture and grain of material, the pleasure of having them against skin. And conversely, perhaps, the cold when they were taken away.

Castiel, of course, remembered none of these things. The body that would know them had not lived in the world yet. Still, he knew the floor beneath his feet were carpeted in the softest striped furs and the table, which he had propped his arm to stand, had the soft warm glow of mahogany. Castiel climbed onto it.

Everyone was moving very fast in one direction, hats or heads bobbing with movement. He was watching a herd, or a school of fish.

"Get down from there and keep moving."

"But I-" The name was lost as the table toppled and Castiel was tipped into the warm current, smelling of spices, cologne, perfume, scent and sweat. He was drowning beneath. He was running with them. Dizzy, he closed his eyes, and suddenly realised they were running in circles on a vast circular track. The stripes on the carpet designated lanes which kept the people moving as if in an ordered current. Occasionally, there would seem like something from the corner of his eyes that descended and went upward again, the long beaks piercingly red. When he passed the polished table, which still bore the mark of his fingerprint for the third time, he leapt onto the table, stepped onto the large centrepiece and grabbed wildly at the air.

The demon screeched, but Castiel held on, his leg tripping on the table runner. The demon opened its wings and flew, carrying Castiel with him, and the long purple velvet trailed beneath them like a banner.

-=-=

He was set down, none too gently, on a bare rock at night. Castiel was too big to escape into the crack into which the demon had plunged. The pebbles broke the skins of his knees and his palms.

The wind whipped, whistling past, hurtling bits of sharp grains of sand through the air. Castiel twined the velvet against his body and stared out into the stillness surrounding him. He tilted his head to listen, but the thread of song was so soft it might have been a lullaby instead of an order, a command, or his purpose.

"Why are you weeping?" Angels did not weep. Castiel's tears stopped.

"Why are you sad?" Angels did not know sadness. Castiel's sadness was stoppered.

"Why are you afraid?" He was afraid of failure. He was afraid of God. The latter was expected, the former he wanted to bury. But the song did not know the ways of hell. It only knew to command angels. Instead of his heart, it was his grace that Castiel heard thumping wildly inside his chest. It accused him of tarrying when he did not know how to fly or swim with these four limbs or the two lungs that insist on taking choking breaths of air.

It was unfair.

He could walk the width of the island in ten steps, the cover its length in twenty. At the twentieth step, he gazed downward into a whirlpool of water, a phenomena of variegated blue and green moving so animatedly as if someone had turned a fire upside down and inside out. He took another precarious step forwards, looking down into its depth. There were so many shadows that it was like looking into a flame. For all Castiel knew, this too, could burn. He was wary of pain, now.

"I am looking for a man, but there is no ship and there is no road to take me to him."

"I will take you to him. I know every man." It seemed as if the whirlpool was speaking, though the churning of the water made it as seem that it was laughing with every syllable.

"I am looking for Dean Winchester."

"Dean Winchester, Dean Winchester..." The whirlpool gurgled the name. It echoed through all the levels of Hell. John Winchester, hearing his son's name ringing against the chains, broke on the rack. Alastair, hearing the call, smiled.

"I know where he is, jump in and I will take you to Dean Winchester," the whirlpool continued. Castiel leapt.

-=-=

"There is a man here for you," said Alastair to Dean, "He traveled a long way and not by the usual way, otherwise we could have him right here with you."

"Sam," Dean remembered. He was neither beyond pain nor beyond thought; the present was one infinite moment, his last moment- an endless stretch of time with claw and teeth tearing at his flesh.

"Our yellow-eyed friend might pay us a visit soon, then. Sam will ask to see you of course."

"Sam," repeated Dean. He breathed harshly through his nose, then drew a breath so sharp that it felt like his throat was being cut. Alastair had leaned in very close, his hands disturbingly free of wood or metal or plastic, one placed lightly against his chest, the other cradling his neck.

"You ask for him so often, yet you're so cheerless when I tell you the good news. All of Hell rings with your name, Dean Winchester. We know he came here for you."

The hands dragged across him, cutting off precise bits of shirt, skin, and flesh- Dean's last moment, variations on a theme.

-=-=

Castile's plunge had been into empty space. The whirlpool caught him and transported him. He was not wet. He was not burned. Pain was curiously absent from the experience.

He found himself in a domed cavern in front of a contraption of solid gold, the surface as smooth as a mirror. A figure in gray rags stood in front of him. The face that turned did not belong in any century or any country. It was as wrinkled as a walnut with brown blood trickled and dried around the tiny black stitches threaded into skin.

"Dean Winchester is inside," he whispered, pointing with one thin finger at the gold.

Castiel went forward and knocked. His fist sank into the soft metal. Each knock produced a clang like a clash of bells. He knocked three times.

Later, in Heaven reporting the proceedings regarding his doings in Hell and elsewhere, Castiel found himself interrogated regarding this specific moment.

"What do you have?"

"Myself."

"What did you have?"

"The command of God."

"Is that all?"

"It was enough." Castiel would answer, uncertain of the import of his statement, that he had not yet seen his own reflection, nor cared that he had one and what it might mean. Thought, for his superiors in heaven, was not a commendable trait in a soldier. Castiel's reply pleased them then.

"Enough!" The figure in hell cried out, the volume much greater than his size, "Don't knock it down. You shall see him."

The door did not open. Instead, the demon rose from the earth, yawning. He froze, seeing Castiel in his foyer.

"You are not him."

"I have come for Dean Winchester."

"You are not him," repeated the demon. He frowned, "Why are you not him?"

"I am not Dean Winchester," Castiel was patient, "Because I have come for him."

The demon glanced at the bell, the dented marks, then at Castiel. He bowed, deeply.

"You're in the house of the panjadarum of Nowhere. I do not hold the one called Dean Winchester yet Alastair said to expect one of our kin, I did not realise he meant someone like you." He chuckled to himself.

Castiel froze.

"Do you wish for a feast? Rest? Clothes? We have all the sensual delights of all past and future fantasies of men." A table laden with food appeared, then a riot of fineries and kneeling servants, carrying mantle of precious stones and sceptres of every hue.

"Dean Winchester-" He began, but the demon sighed. "They are always a bit slow," he seemed to say to no one in particular, "Only one thing at a time. Curious, isn't it, the funny thing about innocence and ignorance?"

He walked closer to Castiel, then, astonishingly, tapped the side of his head.

"I shall take you to Alastair. Be careful of your head. It's a narrow passage."

-=-=

"We have waited for days, Dean," Alastair's needles scratched little red marks into the skin, the last decorative touches around the lacerated meat, "But Azazel has not come, neither has your brother. He must be...delayed."

"Please, don't let him..." Dean's voice faded.

Alastair perked up; he thought Dean would take longer. "What is that?"

"Let me down."

"Oh," It was the boring chant again: let me down, let me go, stop. If Alastair loved perfection less, he would be bored.

"But we haven't had all the fun you are due." And undoubtedly, pleasure, too. A deal was a bargain struck both ways. The universe was a fair, fair thing.

"I can't..." At this point, Dean's pupils had eaten all the green, his skin had gone very pale. It was very dark in here, after all, and if not for the blood, it would be pitch black. As it was, the room's painted a spidery incarnadine.

"Can't what?"

"Let him..."

"See you." Alastair finished for him with a flourish. It was easy now, these last moments. He simply liked to savor. Not everyone had the grace of the hell hounds visited upon their person. The bargains of cross-road demons were mostly boring, but this one had an interesting brother and an interesting enemy. Lilith herself asked for his expertise. And even more fascinating now, even if Alastair did not know his name before, his head now fairly pound with it. Dean Winchester...Dean Winchester...He would remember it, he supposed, though it was not a very interesting name.

"Of course you'll let him see you. We'll show him just what you sacrificed for him, just what he means to you. Meant, I mean."

Dean was in his last throes, his limbs twitching, uncoordinated, but Alastair let off, allowed him to gather one gulp of breath through a punctured lung, "Don't let him see me, like this."

"What are you trying to say?"

The next words were muttered, almost silent, but Alastair heard them. With a smile, Dean's torment in hell ended.

-=-=

The passages were indeed narrow. They were also long and winding. The demon disappeared into a door that disappeared at one point and asked him to continue.

The roof grew lower until Castiel found himself crawling on the ground to move forward, his elbows and knees cramped in the small space. However, when he emerged, there was only one extraordinary creature holding a burning brand in front of a half-flayed soul.

"Alastair, I have come for Dean Winchester." Dusty, ragged, with an anger that was more impatience than resentment, perhaps that was what made Alastair turn from his work.

"Dean's not here," Alastair said, nonchalantly, "But do go look for him."

Dean Winchester had been broken on the rack a long time ago. Alastair had already forgotten about him.

"Where shall I look?"

"He's mine," Alastair said, "And I seem to remember him begin quite good. So he's somewhere around here." He waved in the general area. What Castiel had thought were black walls, he realized, were actually extensions into endless dark space.

"I need a more precise location."

"He will find you, if you know him. It's how these things work." Alastair threw back over his shoulder. He was working.

-=-=

It was lightless where Dean Winchester dwelled. Castiel had never been afraid before. The voice of heaven had long melted into the darkness. He had nothing except the impression of his grace to guide him as he ventured to see Dean Winchester, who, it appeared, was already broken, but that did not matter. It was expected that all humans in hell were broken but as long as the soul remained, they had not strayed beyond God's thoughts.

"Come," Dean Winchester said, "Come closer." His voice was low, "I'm not here to hurt you."

Castiel went closer. He couldn't see who was speaking and asked for a name.

"I'm Dean Winchester."

So Castiel found Dean Winchester. Except, now he did not know what to do.

"Stay with me," said Dean Winchester, "You know me."

Castiel did know Dean Winchester. He knew his name and he knew he must find him. Castiel looked all around him, everywhere darkness and memory of ruin and mortal deaths. He was lost. He would stay with Dean Winchester until he found a way out.

-=-=

For Castiel, who had never had nightmares or lain awake fancying phantasms he could not defeat laying in wait under the bed, in the closet, or in life, there was a strange gentleness to the dark.

Castiel was taken, there was no other word for it, but Dean's hands were smooth and cool on his forearm as he guided Castiel to a house granted to him. That, too, lay in the depth of Nowhere in Alastair's domain, but it belonged to Dean Winchester the moment he remembered his name. Every stone was saturated with the remnant of his soul that knew someone had been looking for him.

And someone had come.

No power in Hell could have denied a bartering of souls; it was the trade that had built its realms and constructed its armies. And like all mercantile powers, Hell was unwilling to lose what it gained.

That Alastair, Hell's best servant, should have been at the rack of the Winchesters was not by chance. It could not be any demon who bore a grudge against human hunters with knowledge of the supernatural. Alastair was a surety. Souls broken beneath his hands were incapable of comprehending that offerings and sacrifices exist.

But the conspiracy of the archangels was only beginning. It had bid Castiel, reduced into the shadowy form of the mortal James Novak to walk through the underworld like an offering for Dean Winchester when Castiel's form was not his own and angels were beings of light, soulless.

If Dean Winchester accepted the trade, Castiel could leave with him, leaving Hell to gape at its own foolishness. If he had not, Castiel would find another way. He had been chosen; he had been charged; therefore, he could not fail. He never had.

Hell twisted all reason and purposes until only an impression of the original was left behind and it allowed Dean to take Castiel into his house.

"Everything here that is mine, is yours," Dean told Castiel as they crossed the threshold, "You are mine, now."

"Yes," Castiel said, amiable, "I am yours."


	3. Chapter 3

The kitchen -- hickory cabinets, tiled floors, silvered appliances - was redolent with the cloying smell of warm sugar.

"Shall we eat first?"

"If you like."

Table and chairs appeared by the breakfast table. Castiel saw their edges and outlines. Dean was very close and very warm yet invisible. Neither the shiny granite counter-top nor the copper-pots hanging overhead from an oval rack showed his reflection.

Castiel felt a slight pressure on the back of his shoulder. He sat, the chair sturdy beneath him.

"They make very good pies. This is apple," Dean said. Castiel saw the fork and something brown and thick sitting atop of the silver tines. It was moving toward him.

"Why can't I see you?" It should not worry him when he had travelled with his eyes closed, but here was the man he was supposed to see and though he strained, there was nothing.

"I can see you though. Open your mouth."

Castiel opened his mouth to speak, and found it stuffed with something solid and achingly sweet.

"Well, how was it?"

"It was fine."

"Just fine? Perhaps you'd prefer pecan." A pecan pie appeared on the table. Then another. It was an endless parade of pies and Castiel was obliged to try samples of each: apple, pecan, banana, banana and cream, strawberry, peach, pumpkin, chocolate...Dean knew each name and said each name aloud while Castiel grew increasingly perturbed.

In this warm kitchen, the ground firm beneath his feet, yet he felt as if a man sitting aboard a ship on a storm tossed sea, watching the lanterns swinging from the beams as the waves crashed against the caulked wood and the dangerous creak and groan of the mast and spars filled the silences.

Dean Winchester should not be bearing the memory of his mortal desires so keenly and Castiel should not feel as he was succumbing to them himself. With each taste, the flavors he could detect multiplied until he was forced to admit a preference.

At length, it stopped. Dean was disturbingly happy, for his voice was cheerful.

"I enjoyed it. Did you?" he asked, "First time can get intense."

"I think so," Castiel answered. After all, it stopped. Now, perhaps, he could begin to mend the man, but the Dean was already putting away the plates, the dishwasher started a low hum. He heard the soft scrape of chair against the floorboards as it was pushed against the table.

"Now let me get you some clothes, and we shall sleep."

"Sleep?" Castiel blinked.

"You know, forty-winks, pillows and mattress. I've a feather bed. It's enormous and wonderful. You should try it."

A hand landed at his shoulder. He heard a yawn by his ear. Then, shockingly, felt his own mouth stretched wide and a gust of air emerging from his mouth.

Nonplussed, he did not speak even as Dean steered him toward and into a bathroom.

"Shower first. The towels are great. Clothes will be coming." Dean reached around him and a burst of water came out of the showerhead before he was pushed into the glass and steel cube and under the water.

Several times, Castiel opened his mouth to speak, but became overwhelmed by the sensations washing over him: the hard jets of water, the cascades of warmth, and the thick white fog that curled around and enveloped him, cloud-like.

"You okay in there?" He was. He wasn't. A burst of cold air blew in and caused goosebumps on his skin. The shower turned off. A towel floated toward him.

"Dean-" he began.

"Dude, I'm not looking, but you look like you're going to drown in there." The towel was warm. Remembering the cold, Castiel wrapped it around his shoulders and carried it out with him. There were clothes in a pile on a drawer. Remembering what Dean said, he dressed himself, awkward with the folds of cloth, and abandoned the towel.

He stood in the middle of a bedroom with one enormous bed, the covers already folded back. The laugh startled him.

"You got the shirt wrong way round. Come, sit on the bed, lift up your arms."

Castiel did so and was redressed with startling efficiency, then he felt a towel rubbing at his head, "You are going to ruin the pillows by dripping," Dean explained and Castiel could feel the strands of his hair on his scalp pulled this way and that. And still he could not speak or command his arm to rise to stop this idleness, "Get in then," Came the happy voice.

"But I-" Dean had caught his hands and pulled him down. It was a very soft bed, the mattress dipped and swelled. The coverlet settled over them. He could feel a shoulder nudging against his.

"Night. It's been a good day," Dean said, then after a pause, "The best I've had in a while, I think." A moment later, Castiel heard faint snoring.

"Night," he said softly, not expecting to sleep, but the next moment he opened his eyes, he was alone in the bed.

-=-=

Dean's absence was reassuring. Castiel had been so long looking for him that to find him present and beside him would have seemed a trick. The lunge into wakefulness was disconcerting, the world at once too bright and too dark. There was a clock at the bedside table, its face frozen, the minute and hour hands pointing at a quarter before noon, or midnight.

He got out of bed then spent the never several hours wandering through the house trying to find the door. Objects appeared from the corner of his eye: clothes in the bedroom, toothbrush in the bathroom, food in the dinning room. Lights and music turned on whereever he walked; it was not a large house, but it seemed as if the rooms constantly changed position. His seventh turn passing the room where he spent the night, objects he thought merely outlines and shadows had became sharper and more vivid in color. Navigation became easier then. There were two floors to the house, three rooms with a bed, the kitchen, a dining room, a living room, an attic where a giant fan grumbled quietly, bringing in streams of cool air. Yet, there were no windows. Castiel shoved open the long curtains in each room, there was nothing behind them.

At the door, he could see the lawn, the low fence, the letter box, and beyond, it seemed as if a painting was melting. Dabs of color ran down hints of shapes. The beige and gray may be a house at the other side of the road or something else altogether. He espied movement.

Castiel started walking, the memory of the house growing fainter behind him. Dean was not there.

-=-=

Light dissolved into darkness between one step and the next. This time, alone in the silence, blind, Castiel was afraid. He called out again, but no one answered. He stepped forward but there was nothing beneath his feet. He sat back abruptly and barely avoided tumbling head-along down, somewhere. Carefully, on his hands and knees, he felt around. Bits of crumpled soil and dried grass lined the edge. Impossible sheer and smooth rock lay beneath it. It could have been a long time, he wasn't sure, but when he found his way back to the driveway and the house, which beckoning ominously in the dark, he saw the door open.

"Why are you crawling?" Dean was invisible, so there was no way to tell his expression, but he sounded puzzled, as if Castiel had merely given an unexpected answer.

Castiel stood up, a bit self-conscious of the way his knees and hands were dirty, his new clothes torn.

"I was looking for you."

"Well, you're not going to find me that way. I'm not a bug on the ground. I was always here," Dean answered.

Was he? Castiel wasn't sure. He couldn't see Dean, after all. "I called your name, but you didn't answer."

"Oh, you mean earlier," but Dean sounded uncertain, "I was at work."

"Work," Castiel repeated, nonplussed.

"You know, a man got to make his living. Won't you come in now? Come on, let me give you a hand. You look like you just crawled out of a grave."

Once again, Castiel allowed himself to be guided into the house, Dean's hands on his shoulders, his voice by his ear, all concern and solicitude. Shower, clothes, and then food. Castiel was seeing a pattern.

Invisible hands showed him how to wash his hands with soap, his hair with shampoo, then rebuttoned his shirt. He felt like a child, being dressed, being shown how everything worked in Dean's world.

"How was your day at work?" he asked politely, watching meat and potatoes being piled onto a plate in front of him.

"Oh, you know, people being people."

Hell had no people, Castiel knew. He was also beginning to suspect that all this was an illusion, though he wasn't sure whose and to what extent. If Dean Winchester was an illusion, if this house was, or if this entire place had been conjured for Castiel's benefit The manifold possibilities were dizzying; he could have been discovered already and was even now trapped in a labyrinthine torment of constant doubt.

"What exactly is it that you do?"

There was a pause, then: "What you do, I suppose."

"I spent the day looking for you," Castiel pointed out.

"Well I probably did the same."

It wasn't an answer, but then again, it was, if Alastair had been honest.

"I spent the day so I can come back here, so you see, it is the same."

Castiel wasn't sure if that was Hell's lack of logic or Dean Winchester's own circular reasoning, but rationality mattered very little at the moment.

"Take me with you tomorrow," Castiel said instead, "So that we don't have to waste the day."

"The boss might not like it-"

"Shouldn't you do what you like?" Castiel ventured, "Be your own boss."

The slap on the table was unexpected, but Castiel was glad to know he was right. If Hell offered everything for Dean to forget who he was, then Castiel would take everything Dean's offer of himself, whatever the pieces.

-=-=

The next day came; light pierced through his closed eyelids it was too warm where he was lying. An alarm rang. Castiel bolted upright.

"What? What?" Dean's arm reached across his lap and slapped the alarm clock. "Go back to sleep," he pressed, the words muffled against the side of Castiel's torso.

"You are taking me to work today."

"I don't have work on Saturday. Monday," Dean groaned, "Weekends are for sleeping in and pancakes."

"I'll go make some," Castiel said automatically. He didn't know how, but he was certain that he must get out of the bed where Dean was sleeping snug against him, human shaped and warmly alive. Castiel swung his legs out of bed then stood beside it. The scene had a curious quality of a painting: sunlight percolating through the curtains, spilling onto a bed where the sheets draped upon the tall body beneath it, a young man in the prime of his life, resting. The impression of his own head was still there on the subtly patterned pillow, like a particularly glaring reminder that if this had been an illusion, then he, too, could be mere simulacrum. But then, he was.

"Coffee, too," grumbled the illusion under the sheets.

Castiel tore his gaze away and went to the kitchen. He pressed a button; coffee began brewing. He followed the instructions on a recipe book on the counter and produced pancakes, soft and golden disks that looked ridiculously becoming on blue plates. He had never made pancakes before.

By the time he heard bare feet on the floor, he had laid out syrup and chocolate sauce and was taking out the whipped cream. It was what the book said.

"You made pancakes."

The voice held more disbelief than Castiel liked. "I said I would make them."

"And you did. You are wonderful. Don't you want any? They're delicious."

"I'm not hungry."

"Oh."

Sighing, Castiel sat down and forked over a couple for himself. He had no obligation to please Dean, but to displease him seemed unnecessarily cruel. The pancakes did taste delicious and he said so, which prompted various experiments with toppings.

Dean was trying to feed him again and Castiel was still uncertain whether his pleasure stemmed from gluttony or something more subtle and terrible.

"You are frowning again."

"Why can't I see you?"

"I don't know. I wish you could. Perhaps there's something wrong with your eyes."

"There is nothing wrong with my eyes. I made you pancakes."

"Perhaps it takes time. I know when I first got here I was wandering like a blind man until I got better."

He spoke like a child. He was like a child, Castiel realised, with a child's sympathies and joys though this innocence was an artifact of hell, a mask concealing some awful...thing.

"Where do you think we are?" he asked more gently.

"In our house, in our life."

"Where is our life?"

"Here and now."

"I see." It could be Saturday, Sunday, Monday, December or June. Dean's whims commanded any time Castiel would spend here. He could be infinitely stalled. He felt almost reassured; he had fought in sieges before.

"What do you want to do today?" He put the fork down and looked at the place opposite his, hoping his eyes were meeting Dean's, "Tomorrow's Monday. You're going to show me your work."

-=-=

Morning faded, the road appeared with every step with Dean walking beside him. There was no darkness and no houses. Beneath their feet was hard-packed earth, so dark it might as well be black.

Others joined them on the road. Streetlamps appeared, there was a semblance of sunlight. Silence had settled over Dean the moment they stepped outside the house. A gray haze loomed over them. Dean's hand was around his wrist.

"Can you see the road?" he whispered at the beginning.

Castiel nodded, unwilling to speak. The fact that he could filled him with an empty horror, for he did not know where it might led except that he was on a road in Hell. He regretted the part he played for them being here. Even knowing it was necessary, to leave behind the cavernous safety of the house, the comfort that he had found Dean Winchester and could even now feel the imprint of his hand on his skin was not as great as he had hoped. Though he could see the tiny swirls carved onto the street lamps, the dark road, and all the pale souls walking down, the man he had come to find remained invisible. He did not know whether Dean Winchester's face was gripped in fear, joy, hunger, sadness or the blank resignation he could see on the other souls'. No one paid them any heed. They were all human, eyes downcast, silence hung as heavy as a pall upon them. They were dead; they were in Hell.

The road was very wide and very straight. They encountered no crossroads, no sounds, and no being that might have paid them any attention. Unconsciously, Castiel pressed his side against the solid form beside him and ignored the slick coldness on his skin that threatened Dean's hold. Finally, the hand slipped; Castiel felt as if he had thrown up his heart.


	4. Chapter 4

A hand closed over his mouth. It still smelled of butter and toast.

"Shh," Dean whispered by his ear, but he sounded out of breath, his chest falling and rising rapidly behind Castiel's back. They kept walking. Dean's hand trailed down his arm again and circled around his wrist more tightly as Castiel stretched open his hand and reached with his fingers until the grip answered. They stepped off the road and into a nondescript doorway. The door hissed open.

Outcrops of yellow sulfur burned along the walls, filling the room with a pungency Castiel had lately came to associate with eggs. Nausea rose from the pit of his stomach. There were others when they entered and he saw them clearly. They looked up as a door chime rang, smiles and a greetings dying at the sight of, presumably, himself.

"Who's your young friend?" The closest asked curiously and held forward a hand, broad-palmed and covered with rust-colored callouses. Castiel looked down at the criss-crossed lines and studied the traces of effluvia encrusted in the fissures of dead skin.

"My friend," Dean answered, making no attempt to take it. He had stepped between them, half-concealing Castiel behind himself and was even now walking backwards as if he did not wish Castiel to see them, or them to see Castiel. The former was a futile movement, for though Castiel could feel the stiffness of the back against him, he could also see, quite clearly, through it to the man now rubbing his dirty hands on his trousers. He was bearded, human in appearance, with strange deep eyes as if in midst of possession though that was not possible. Vessels had to have physical forms.

"Doesn't he have a name?"

"You don't need to know it." Dean's voice was lower here. He turned away from the man speaking only to encounter another question.

"All right, Dean's friend. What do you do?"

"He looks for me."

There was a long whistle and a burst of laughter echoed around the room. "That can take some work!"

"Why don't you look at me? Aren't I worth looking for?" The hoarse voice and the familiar appeal jolted Castiel, but it was a man who asked, a cyclops of one blue eye and a blackened arm. The questions, uttered in the same breath, nonetheless had very different meanings for Castiel, who found himself avoiding them by looking all about him.

They were in a torture chamber: quaint with historicity, charming with pedantic accuracy. Castiel recognized the tools on the walls; he had seen these artifacts being devised, used, abandoned, reclaimed, improved, replaced in the human world through the two thousand years he was flowing ever so slowly into the bloodline that could consent to bear his form.

Skin peeled, muscles exposed, tendons frayed, bones shattered, organs leaked, and blood ran, viscous and thick, draining from bodies that human souls could remember. The crack and billow of furnaces filled all the silences in between. Without the questions, he could hear beneath that the incessant "Please, please, please" scratching the air. And once he distinguished the word, it was all he could hear until he wasn't sure if it came from his own head or from everywhere.

Castiel grabbed Dean's forearm, his fingertips digging into the spaces between the tendons, "Is your work torture?" He was in Hell, but the dichotomy between the man who had only this morning breakfasted at bacon and french-toast and freshly brewed coffee and the man who considered the ghastly scene them with equal equanimity was appalling. This was the man he had traveled through the length of Hell and dared silence to save.

"I'm saving them. Let go, that hurts." Castiel could imagine the man bewildered, though it could scarcely be greater than his own. Or the pain. He felt awash in it though he had no wounds. Instead, a subtle space in his chest felt raw and abraded.

"How are you saving them? How can you save them, here?" Castiel couldn't stop himself. Dean was pulling away, but he couldn't let him go.

"They're wrong, can't you see? They don't work right. They don't want-" Dean explained until he faltered suddenly. People -- and Castiel would consider them such when Dean remained among their number -- were staring. Castiel moved until he thought he stood in front, blocking his view from the audience. He himself ignored the hungry expressions in front of him where Dean's face and body should have been, where the soul he had come to save should be visible.

"What don't they want?" He tried to catch the eyes he couldn't see, hold the gaze he was due.

"They don't want to live. They say 'Stop' and 'Let me die' or 'Let me disappear'," Dean Winchester sounded broken; he was broken, Castiel reminded himself, but he was still Dean; "I can't let them die. They must want to live. I am Moreau at his island, carving them into better things."

Furrowing his brow, Castiel repeated the words to himself and puzzled at each cryptic syllable. Belatedly, he realized it was a human reference.

"I want to save them, you see, and this is the only way it works; hurting them so they might wake up from that dream and see that this world is worth living in; this real world where they only have themselves and no one else. Then, the pain gets needless." He trailed off and Castiel felt a hand laying against his chest. His existence was putting the lie to Dean's words. And yet, he was not fully there, for he had told Dean that he couldn't see him. The realization hurt.

"Let us go home." Castiel relaxed his hand, the loose circle of his fingers drifting toward the gentle swell of Dean's palm, still scarred in memory of his life in the world.

"I must finish here. They're my," Dean hesitated, "Responsibilities."

"You don't." They were not. But he had lost Dean. Even without seeing him, Castiel knew that Dean had turned his back. His voice was rough, a strange thread of fire heating the steel.

"You'll have to wait because saving these people's my work," It continued, ruthless, "Then I might look at you, as a reward."

-=-=

The muzzle of a gun slid into the recesses of a body and emerged gleaming red. Thin blades of steel perforated skin and scissors reconstructed the topography of soft flesh. Plastic, molded in the shape of strange things, reached to pinch, poke and prod permanent and ephemeral holes into vagaries of meat. And then, the complex compounds in iridescent bottles made their way through mouth, throat, gullet, and out again. Rivulets of filth, stink, and blood, slithered across the floor.

As the cries of the souls grew in depth and intensity, Castiel found himself clenching his fists and biting his lip. The expressions of exquisite suffering steadily grew on him. His muscles tensed; he couldn't breathe; he leaked tears. He wanted to go away, but he couldn't move. His mouth was dry. He licked his lip and tasted warm copper. Cold gorge started rising, burning up his throat. Castiel had seen and felt pain; he had accepted agonies and deaths as part of the ineffable plan; nonetheless, he had never been witnessed pain for as an end onto itself or subjected himself to the phantom grasp of empathy of bodily suffering.

Castiel was falling sick. The strange architecture of a human form and all its incumbent sympathies overwhelmed him. The pain was a contrapuntal euphony. It was an orchestration of high and low notes arranged in metronomic accompaniment to the unfolding of what should have been an unanswerable theme. Worse still, Dean was behind all the objects and movements: the solid, fluid, and the gaseous exhalations of suffering. They were the only evidence of his being as the moments wore on, unmeasurable.

Young and old, male and female, a string of souls passed through the space between where Dean Winchester worked and Castiel watched. Castiel watched as they were bound, tortured, and humiliated. As each body died of its torments, it was reformed again, but a little part would be missing: the top of a ear, the tip of the nose, perhaps a knuckle. Every renewal took its toll, leaving a swirl of black dust in its place, which grew more disordered until they scattered. Eventually, body and memory disappeared and pain and pleadings melted away. Instead, a shriek of wild laughter, close to a scream, twisted into the air and no trace of the soul remained. They were not demons, lacking all consciousness, but they became part of the matter of Hell, part of its spoils and its wealth.

Castiel's knees threatened to collapse. He was witnessing the destiny of the souls turned away from God, gone beyond redemption. Nothing in Heaven had prepared him. God had conceived angels and bound their existence with His. They did not know any other creatures who was not. And now, there was no reassuring touch on Castiel's human shaped hand and no voice from Heaven to ease his doubt. Castiel could believe that the torturer was not the man he had come to save. He did not know where he was. He wished to leave.

Nevertheless, Castiel stayed, his eyes wide open. And with every soul in Hell that reached its finality and dissolved into blackness, Castiel saw Dean more clearly. Once or twice, he caught the shadow beneath his jaw or the soft gleam of his hair highlighted by a droplet of red blood.

-=-=

Rain spattered onto the ground, too insubstantial to darken the earth.

The clear liquid dripped down Castiel's hair, slid down his nose. His thin shirt was twisted around his waist where Dean was clinging onto it. The hard curve of a nail was digging into his back.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Dean Winchester was whispering against his neck, the warm breath mixing unpleasantly with the cold trickle of rain. Castiel wondered if he knew what he was sorry for. The words may very well have been an echo, fading to mere cant. The souls on the racks Castiel witnessed had said much of the same. He was afraid now that the words may mean nothing to him, for his sympathy had been with Dean Winchester, breaker of those souls who thought he was saving them. And what did that say about him, who had came to save Dean Winchester when Dean Winchester was already invisible? He felt out of balance, swaying precariously on a rolling ship, his insides so stirred that his stomach and heart had changed places.

The road back seemed longer and colder, but the quality of light was ruddy with sunset. There were no clouds in the sky though the rain continued. It was a strange and awkward shuffle until the house came into view.

"You are wet." Dean said, closing the door behind them, "Are you cold? Do you want me to turn the heater on?"

Castiel closed his eyes against the sight of towels floating towards them.

"What is wrong?"

"Your work is torture. You break souls to build Hell." Castiel order was to deliver Dean Winchester. Heaven did not not owe him an explanation and he was not given any. He wanted to ask now, amidst the eerie silence. Why him? Why Dean Winchester? For once, he wished to glimpse into the ineffable plan.

"I thought I explained it to you." Dean said miserably.

"But it was not a reason."

"Are you going to leave?" If Castiel left, Hell would keep Dean Winchester forever. If he left, he would have failed. This then, had been the trick.

"No."

"I wish you can see me. If you see me, you might like me more. People always preferred my face to my voice. If you can see me-" He was going to go on. Castiel had to stop him. He turned. He had come for Dean Winchester and there, shimmering in the unholy water like a mirage, his features barely discernible beneath the fracturing of light, was Dean Winchester's soul, not yet beyond saving.

"Don't go there anymore," Castiel tried, touching a shoulder. Dean's head turned to look at it and back at Castiel's face as if startled.

"Where will we go?" He asked. Castiel's wondered if it was possible to blaspheme in Hell.

"A place of eternal peace," He said instead, to be safe, "Where we shall see each other as we truly are."

"Really?" But there was no enthusiasm to the word, so Castiel bent forwards and kissed him on the cheek. Everything felt different in this house, his body more sensitive and his thoughts more confused. Stubble pricked at the tender skin of his mouth where he had bitten his lip. Dean Winchester tasted like the sea and salt. Perhaps those were tears that had been falling, not water.

"I promise."

-=-=

That night, Castiel did not sleep. He sat at the edge of the bed, head tilted, listening. He listened to the slow and even inhale and exhale of Dean Winchester's breaths, the sussurus of the sheets, and the low hum of the attic fan whirling on in a house with no windows in a place with no air. He was unwinding the grace within himself, careful not to break the form of the vessel.

Turning toward the bed, he looked at Dean and for the first time began to understand the task before him, for the face of the soul was scarred and marred, tattered, as if a strong wind would be enough to scatter it into a thousand places.

"I am angel of the lord. I have come to deliver you, Dean Winchester," He whispered and leaned forward, touching a shoulder for the beginning of an embrace. He withdrew it quickly when the warmth beneath hand began to burn. But it was too late, Dean cried out. He clutched at Castiel's back and struck the shadowy upper arm. It was as if he lit a match. Castiel's whole form began to glow, his grace unwinding faster and faster. Dean eyes opened, liquid and green, pupils shrank to pinpoints of black against the light, but his gaze slid sideways over Castiel's shoulder. The house, the walls of the room, the bed, the lights, everything melted away. Demons surrounded them, jeering.

"Come out, Dean Winchester's friend. Come and help us! Dean is nothing. He has nothing. We'll show you how much he cares about you. How little of him there is." With cold dread, Castiel turned and realized weapons they brandished weren't meant for him.

Having no choice, Castiel fled, carrying the precious memory of Dean's soul with him.


	5. Chapter 5

The sudden flare of Castiel's grace moving swiftly in flight, a single firefly's glow in the dark, drew the attention of the demons and left them blinking at the afterimage. Then, as if awoken from a strange new dream, the demons fled throughout the four corners of Hell, hissing in wonder of what they saw. Rumors swelled, spun and twisted: an archangel, a host of angels, the message of God writ on the sky, or the hand of God Himself manifesting. Yet, the sentries reported the gates of Hell unassailed, so who of Heaven would dare the domain of Alastair, the graveyard of souls?

Confused, the lords of Hell went to Lucifer, who laughed. He gave no order.

-=-=

Castiel did not go far. He hid amidst the rot of the corpses and the stench of congealed ponds of blood. Perched precariously on a ledge just beneath that sheer cliff-face beyond the circle of the house, though the house itself was gone, he could see everything beyond it: the dirt clinging to the mounds of wet yellow bones, the dead grass and dried maggots that hung from its cracks. It was as if a veil had been torn from before his eyes, but the comfort was empty. Everything he saw was unearthly and ugly.

Peering through the tufts of stringy dirt, he watched the demons scattering, trampling over Dean Winchester's body in their haste. Dean's eyes had closed; blood trickled, sluggish, from fresh claw-marks.

A carrion demon arrived, poked and prodded at him with its long beak, but soon grew bored and flew away. Castiel waited until the slow blooming of bruises steadied, but the demon Alastair appeared on the road and sauntered onwards until he crouched down and laid an oddly possessive hand on Dean Winchester's neck, the skin denting beneath his thumb.

Dean's eyes opened and his lips began to curl. Castiel stared, transfixed by the smile he had never seen. Dean sat on the ground and looked up at the demon. The corner of his mouth dropped.

"I've heard the reports. You're slacking, Winchester."

"Alastair, I slept and there was--" He frowned and shook his head as if something was clinging to it. Alasdair slapped him. It was an easy movement, delivered so quickly and casually Castiel was surprised at the sound. When Dean turned his direction again, his lips were very red.

"Well, wakey wakey. Busy, busy. So much to do and so little time You'll enjoy what comes next." And Alasdair closed his hand around Dean's wrist and pulled and Dean stretched upwards, following the movement, every line of his body taut with tension for a brief moment before relaxing. He scratched at the blood on his torso with his other hand- an idle gesture, for they remained on his skin between the materials of a tattered shirt.

"What is that?" Alastair was looking at Dean's shoulder, "Wouldn't have anything to do with that rumor that's crawling in all the holes and crevasses would it?"

Dean twisted around. The burn had scabbed over, black and hideous. Castiel could still smell how the flesh bubbled beneath his hand.

"Must have been yours," Dean was saying to Alastair. He stood. "I don't know how else I would have gotten it."

"Must have been," Alastair murmured, one gnarled finger tracing its outline, pushing up the sleeve, "Those hell hounds were more inventive than I thought." Then he bent his head and extended a long forked tongue. At the first touch, heat rushed through Castiel and he almost fell off where he was clinging, but Dean was still. The crust glistened, wet and shiny afterwards, peeling at the edges when Alastair lifted his mouth and licked his lips.

"Let us go," said Dean Winchester.

They went. Castiel emerged from his hiding place, wistful and encumbered with something he could not yet name.

Castiel sat down where he had attempted to hold Dean Winchester but instead had wounded him with his grace. Castiel had seen Dean Winchester and he knew he could rebuild a man with that impression. There would be a body to house a personality and a memory, and it would not be entirely soulless, but it would be simple, a child in a man's body, devoid of will no more sophisticated than the upkeep of its flesh- a vessel perfect in its simplicity.

God had not commanded for more, but Castiel wanted more than a sudarium. He wished to coalesce all the bits and pieces of Dean Winchester he had glimpsed and felt in this borrowed body- the man who had doubted while cleaving to him and to whom he promised himself and peace. Dean had burned, but he also bore the pain of Castiel's grace without letting go. Castiel could still feel the print of Dean's hand on the strong bend of his wing and below, where the shafts had curved beneath unaccustomed warmth.

The order from his superior simply must not have been clearly conveyed or understood. If Heaven saw how demons were made and how souls could disintegrate, innumerable and invisible, scattered throughout Hell, they would have not have merely ordered him to return Dean Winchester to earth.

Castiel wanted to recall Dean Winchester as he had been before he entered Hell and as he had known him in Nowhere. The thought was perilous, for how he could he want a man, any man, when all men belong to God? How could he want Dean Winchester, who was not only a man, but a man who was to be Michael's vessel? There was no law in heaven that decreed angels should not want. Yet, angels could not sin and covetousness was a sin made common and irredeemable by past examples.

In the silence all around him, heedless of the parody of dust beneath his feet, Castiel remembered his promise and that angels could not lie. They were made without earth and as God's thoughts engendered them so they could not think beyond it. He tilted his head, trying to catch an echo of Heaven. There was no warning and no reproof.

On the sand where the house had been, Dean Winchester's footsteps beside the demon Alastair's left a trail. Though sometimes, there was only one set of footprints, Castiel followed them.

A wind rose behind him, the sand shifted, and covered his tracks as if he had never been there. Once upon a time, Castiel had been the perfect soldier.

-=-=

Alastair saw Castiel first.

"Haven't I seen you somewhere before?"

"I was looking for Dean Winchester."

Alastair swept his hand toward Dean Winchester. "So you did, that recalcitrant boy. You found him. He did not accept you." He frowned, the great ridged brow knitting close together. "Why are you still here. Leave, depart. This is not your place."

"I'm taking what is mine," Castiel dared. Much later, in the angelic consistory, Castiel's acknowledgment of the private covenant between himself and Dean Winchester in the first moment of their meeting became evidence of his treachery; an usurpation of authority beyond his rank. Neither Heaven nor Hell would recognize the claim.

For now, Alastair merely disagreed. "Can't let you take my best pupil. He slept and woke up with a new wound. So perfect. He's nearly ripe."

Castiel suppressed a shudder, but not his curiosity. "Ripe for what?"

"Eternity," the demon crowed. "These things require patience; an age has to pass before they mature the proper flavor and bite," The long tongue snaked past his lips, its ends twitching in excitement, "Dean Winchester, by the grace of your presence, was forced into a reminder he realized he could not bear to remember, as himself. Numberless animals, numberless children, and yet people keep trying. I love them for it, you know, the futile belief that they would only have to satisfy Hell for it to vomit life back into a corpse. Now you know what cemeteries full of bloody wives and soldiers have known before you: a man in Hell always deserves it. You've come for what you thought worth saving, but when he recognized your sacrifice, he must also recognize himself, and all that he did here and elsewhere. The prayer to be happy is the same in heaven, earth, and hell. Having seen himself here, Dean Winchester knows he would not be happier on earth. Why should he return? He is here for my plucking, my delight, my joy."

Castiel remained silent. He wish he had not asked. Angels had no unhappiness or happiness, but men did. He did not know why should Dean Winchester wish to return. The touch of Castiel's grace took oblivion from him-

"Time to own up; leave," Alastair grinned, "or stay. O innocence, what we can do with you-" The grin grew wider, exposing the red gum and the strong molars to view.

Castiel took a step forward. "I, too, have an eternity. My patience is infinite. I will wait here, with him and for him until I can give him sufficient reason."

"You do that," Alastair said, "I've heard it all before." He turned to the figure who had been looking between them, silent. "Come, Dean, we have work to do; do make sure your barnacal doesn't get in the way."

Dean Winchester turned toward Castiel. "You were there in my dream, a nightmare, really. I was myself and yet I was not. You are not who I expected; then again, I don't know why I would expect him to come when I'm here for him. I don't want him here; that was the whole point. And you, I don't even know who you are." The last sounded like an accusation.

"Nonetheless, I am here for you and you alone. You lived in a house with me. I was with you as you ate and slept even before I saw you. And then, I made a promise to you-" Dean flinched.

"People have always made promises," he said, "in dreams or elsewhere."

"I have only made one promise and it was not a dream," Castiel said, hurting.

"I always keep mine, now I'm here." Dean shrugged. "But first there was the pain. I can't say I'm not glad it's gone. I hope yours will lead you to a better place."

"It will. It is for you. It is real."

"Why would you-" But before Dean finished his question, Alastair was almost out of sight. As if yanked on a leash, he scrambled after him.

-=-=

Castiel had never been tempted except, perhaps, when he had argued himself into following an order he was not given because he had made a promise out of pity or something else that came part and parcel with the borrowing of humanity and human limitations. That had always been the danger. What did angels knew about the weakness of the flesh except that it was weak? It bled, it craved, it spiraled towards death and decay with every moment. It had fascinated Lucifer. Did it fascinate you, Castiel, Zachariah asked much later? Did it fascinate that you had a body that required nourishment and defecation? Were you so addicted to the idea of ruin that you lingered in Hell beyond what was expected for mere man?

What was expected?

Castiel never reminded Zachariah that he had been the one chosen by Michael even as Dean Winchester was chosen. By then, it would have been useless.

He went to the rack again. Dean Winchester did not hold the whip, the dowel, the cudgel or any of the instruments that brought the body pain. Castiel went into torture willingly. With a philosophical bend of the head, still listening for the music that was no longer there, he stepped onto the rack and spread his arms.

Dean stared at him as if he was mad.

"You are not- I'm not-" He gestured between them and then at the sad man mumbling names held between two demons.

"I can't let you torture him," Castiel said quietly. "I have seen it before and I cannot bear it."

Dean turned toward Alastair, who gave him a hair-raising grin.

"Why not, Dean Winchester? Whose witchcraft gave him to you? And so, to me." Alastair traced Castiel's inner arm with the rough pad of a thick thumb until he reached the wrist where he pressed down, hard, at the delicately knotted juncture where Castiel's pulse remained even.

"I cannot do anything to you," Alastair said. "You can do anything with yourself, but you know all that, don't you? What is your name? Who're your family? Who did you offend? More importantly, you're in the way."

Castiel did not answer.

"Your preoccupation with dear Dean is almost impressive, but he is my best pupil and you-" The last word lingered in the air. Castiel would allow his form to be defiled, his voice to grow ugly with screams, and his grace to meld even more closely to the form it wore so he did not have to see Dean wreck souls into dust and nothingness, but the wait was unbearable. He never wished to linger in this place.

"My suffering would be enough," Castiel answered. Bonds snaked past his wrist, ankles, waist and neck. As he willed, he was bound to the rack to suffer.

Alastiar turned toward his pupil. "What do you say, Dean?"

"I said I can't," Dean replied, unthinking.

"Then up you go-" Alastair looked up at Dean from under his eyes and made a gesture. Suddenly Dean was lifted up, his arms stretched above his head, held by invisible hands.

"Wait, what? What are you doing? You said it was over." And Castiel couldn't move. He strained; but he had wished to suffer; he could not break the bonds.

"You are a liar, Dean Winchester." Alastair reached up and tore off the scab on his arm, eliciting a scream, blood dripped, pit-pat onto the ground. "You swore to me. Your will to mine. You to me. Nothing. Else. He I cannot touch, but you. You, my boy, you're mine forever. Only mine."

An imp hurried up holding up something obscene. Alastair turned to Castiel, hollow-faced and hollow-eyed except for the smile.

"Watch, hindrance, watch," he said and lifted up for the first stroke. When it landed, Castiel opened his mouth and his throat trembled.

-=-=

The water was brackish. Castiel sat in a boat in the middle of a strand of unmoving sludge. Dean Winchester was at the prow, the curve of his back heartbreakingly perfect.

"You cried out," he said.

"I did," Answered Castiel hoarsely.

"You shouldn't have."

"It was," Castiel hesitated, "pain."

"But it was mine. I had to bear it. I'm the one who got tortured. You shouldn't share it. Why would you?"

"Because I made a promise for you and to you. You should remember that. I would end your torment."

"By sacrificing yourself? I get it. You are selfless and goodness knows what kind of deal that got you involved in this mess."

"It's not."

"What? A deal? You mean you weren't some side-effect of some poor bastard's magic gone wrong or whatever?"

"It's not that, but, I meant to say, Dean, that it is not a mess."

Dean let out a bark of laughter, but he never turned around. He lowered his head and his shoulders shook. Castiel would wait for him. The only wounds in Hell were those borne in life on earth. Castiel was not hurt. All his limbs were intact, his skin as smooth as any mirror. He could recover.


	6. Chapter 6

"Still here then."

Alastair did not have a physically imposing form. If Castiel had been human, he could loomed over him, but he never had reason to intimidate using a mortal body and demons of Alastair's kind did not fear the shape of things, so Castiel merely rose from his seat and stood over Dean like an inadequate shield.

"Come to gloat?" Dean asked. He sat with elbows tucked in, pressing his hand against his stomach, still expecting the cool slide of metal against skin, the toothmarks and snaps of bone of his memory. He looked at Alastair then regretted it. Castiel and his blood drenched clothes filled his sight.

Alastair waved a hand at them, "I can leave you both here for a hundred years and it could be a second or a thousand years on earth. Reflect," he laughed and stepped from the shore and walked onto the water, "Reflect in these sewers; stay on these benches; the boat merely spins in place. Does he tell you what he sees?"

Castiel's voice was still raw from screaming, "I am, as you say, still here," Castiel said, casting his eyes on Dean and refusing to look at the black water or what visions it might hold, "Time doesn't exist if nothing changes. I am here for him."

"I could almost say you've done this before, but that is impossible." Alastair sniffed, "And yet, there's a burr in the air around you. It tickles me to see it. It gives me hope that perhaps you, too, will belong here one day. Will you accept everything and wait forever for a man who doesn't know you? Whose memory of earth cannot bring him happiness? You know he is not worth it."

"I am with him for all time and through all things." He had began his journey long before a demon could call himself Alastair and wear the name to suit, "His worth is not yours to judge."

"Will you torture him, Dean Winchester?" Alastair needled, "You already are because you refuse to be happy, look at how upset the man is. But, poor boy, how can you be happy here or elsewhere? Think of everyone you saved from us and think of everyone you didn't save and think of everyone you damned to your own fate or worse."

"I saved them," Dean's had not been screaming this time, but it was very quiet when he answered, "So they won't be like me."

Alastair laughed, high and piercing, an animal sound from a humanoid mouth. "Oh, no one's like you; no one's ever so committed to the craft, to the art, and so determined to be like me. The beauty is that even if it's for a different purpose, the results is the same. It's what we care for here, results. But what is it to be? Will you torture this barnacle here? He can feel nothing if he likes- a surprisingly tough shell, for all his delicate bones and pretty eyes," Alastair's gesture was obscene, "And you really can't save him; he's not going to go away by the usual methods. But you know what I think, Deano? I think you should give him his suffering, convince him that you want to stay. Might make him go away and make our relationship a little easier. Make your life easier here. That's the important thing. You know you don't want me angry. It's hateful glued to your seat, I know, all those faces in the water and so soon after being reminded how you died-"

And Castiel understood.

"Say yes, Dean Winchester." When Dean didn't speak, Castiel touched him lightly on the shoulder until he turned around, "Have faith, I have never lied."

"Not yet," Alastair added, soft with malevolence, but he released his hold. Dean could stand. In the darkness, his pupils rippled black across the green and the faint reddish light of a faraway fire ruddied his skin, but Castiel saw the man he wanted to know, who laid his faith in him. He extended his hand to Dean, who took it unhesitating. Alastair hissed and turned away.

"He doesn't deserve it," the words echoed inside the cavern. It might have been meant for them both, but Castiel knew he should have never minded demons, especially not this one. Let them gloat, let them mock, let them distract; they were always unimportant because lies and tricks were insubstantial things. Happiness was never the stuff of an hour, a day, or a lifetime.

Dean Winchester had never needed convincing. Alastair was wrong.

Why should a man's despair in Hell be different from his despair on earth? All men desired happiness yet it only existed in the perfect alignment of their will to that of the divine. They were for God and for each other. And even here, whatever the humanity of Dean desired of heaven, no matter how quietly, Castiel would obtain it for him. In this way, a man may be lifted from Hell by an angel chosen and created for this purpose.

-=-=

James Novak was essaying a true kiss for the first time, the shape of his lips molded to seal another breath, an ecstasy so awkward and wonderful that he ignored the sudden contraction in his chest.

Subtly, quietly, in the darkness, the frame that held endless loop of discursive time shifted as Castiel took on all the limits of Dean Winchester onto the image of the inexperienced body not grown fully into himself, its fate still blank and unmapped.

At that moment, Castiel's superiors would've been surprised to learn that James Novak would be shot in the very near future.

Lashed to the rack, the first bullet had singed Castiel's hair. The second struck his side- the pain an exact replica of the ones that gave Dean the star-burst scars on his torso.

There were no chains or rope burns destined in the blood of a family that had offered itself to God and his agents since time immemorial. And yet, Castiel struggled. The rough fibers of the ropes tore the skin on his wrists and the cold metal of each link pressed bruises on his flesh. All these things, Dean Winchester knew and Castiel was learning. The acrid smell of burning flesh made him choke and his eyes leak.

"Will you go away?" Dean asked him, cupping the side of his face. The skin of his hand was cracked and bloodied, broken by the screw and the hammer that laid their marks on Castiel's body.

"No."

"But you can."

Taking a breath was difficult; Castiel was winded by the pain, shivering without volition. The torments of Dean Winchester's last hours had not been as awful as what he had suffered and endured in life. So this was agony-- fighting the urge to leave this body and to rest in the unknown-- because Dean Winchester was right, Castiel could leave, except he would not.

He had taken too long to answer. Dean took a mordant and it splattered across his chest. Blood rose to the surface, welled forth, and ran down in thin rivulets.

"I know all of this," Dean told him, meeting his eyes, "It is mine. Leave me be."

But Dean Winchester was chosen. Castiel was chosen. What was Michael's meaning: you shall wage war with your body and struggle with death? Castiel had imagined... No, it was Zachariah who had given him the interpretation: the vessel will feel strange, resurrection will be difficult. Castiel thought it referred to an engineering project, the perfect linearity had stunned him at first, but he had accepted the simplicity. How could he know that he himself shall experience the living flesh and desire its end and not its beginning?

Castiel's head ached; his vision swam. He swayed into each blow because his body was feverish, his mind bursting with staccato whispers. The abrupt flashes of pain grounded him. Dean was changing before his eyes, morphing into strange shapes. He was a clawing animal, a winged beast, a reptilian abomination, his maw filled with hooked teeth; he was a statue of black ice, a vagary within a jet of boiling water; he was blue fire that Castiel had only recently learned could burn--

"Go," the soughing was loud, "Go!"

But Castiel clung to the agony of Dean Winchester and refused. "Poor humanity-" Who said that? Castiel turned his head sharply, seeking the source.

"Why won't you go away?" The murderous ink of Deans' eyes were glistening. Castiel focused his attention on the odd shine. After a while, he realized that Dean was actually expecting an answer. The madness was passing. Dean looked human again, the clear delicate angles of his face beautifully reassuring.

"I promised you," he replied, "It was not a dream. I promised you-" He repeated, pain cutting off his words. His entire body felt wet: tear, sweat and blood sloshing inside of him and pouring out of him. The sheer volume astonished him.

"I made a promise, too," Dean finally said.

"You have fulfilled it," Castiel said.

"I'm sorry." And Dean Winchester would've been mortified to know that he could faint from relief, but he did, and there was no shame it in Hell when the angel who caught him stumbled beneath his weight.

-=-=

The solid substance that was Dean Winchester surprised Castiel so much that he almost let him fall. The wound on Castiel's thigh had not fully healed and they were both slippery with sweat and blood. For a moment, he felt the slick heat against his own skin. He drew a sharp breath, but then the sensation was gone. He was himself again.

Alistair was angry. He saw Castiel carry out Dean Winchester, his slight form unbowed beneath the weight. The bloom of pain in Castiel's leg and the sudden exhaustive joy for Dean took place where ignorance was considered virtuous. Alastair reached out to take them both, his long hands stretching, the long nails horned and twisting, snapping together in the emptiness.

"Come back, come back and be damned!" he shouted.

Ignoring the ramble behind him, Castiel carried Dean away. He didn't know where he was going, but Alastair was not the only demon in Hell and Castiel did not know the way out.


	7. Chapter 7

He was running on the moist earth. Leathery wings batted against his head from above; slimy tentacles grabbed at his legs from below. The screams of agony on the racks had faded into a dull roar. Thoughts of other sufferings no longer mattered. His muscles were burning. The soft cool suckling ground became a strange temptation against the soles of his feet. Then the ugly sheer walls bordering Alastair's domain came into view. Castiel cried out and almost collapsed. The walls were dotted with innumerable entrances, each one endlessly dark and each one identical to all the others.

"Help me, find me," he said aloud, but Dean was unconscious in his arms and Heaven still could not penetrate so far.

Alastair was behind him. Castiel could hear the squish of mud and blood with each of his steps. They grew louder.

With guilt and something like despair, Castiel laid Dean gently against one of the walls and turned to face the demons.

"Tsk, tsk. One way in, one way out, such is the way of all flesh, a death for a death." Alastair did not dare to be too close, but the smaller demons-- featureless and their limbs distorted as if subjected to arcane experiments -- circled closer. They carried no weapons, but why should they when they did not need to harm him at all? Castiel couldn't leave.

"Then let him go," Castiel offered. He looked to the sky, the hard baked shiny surface a million miles away from the clear ether he knew as home, then faced the sordid knot in front of him.

"He is not here at all," Alastair said. "Look at how he twitches, those lovely lashes fluttering. He dreams and I don't know of what he dreams. Perhaps," he mused, "he dreams of the way out. Pity you can't accompany him. Accompany me instead, trickster." His voice grew soft at the last, almost gentle. His shape blurred, turned white and almost vaporous, infinitely malleable. "We will be anything you desire."

Castiel opened his mouth. His vocal cords tightened, air passed through the larynx then laughter burst out, wild with relief.

"Then you will wake Dean Winchester and I," he was falling into the trap Heaven had laid for him, the ineffable plan was inescapable after all though he would never know it, "I will stay in his place."

Hardly were those words spoken when the ground began to shake. The rumbling grew louder and angrier as if a great wind was passing through the earth. The demons cried out then scurried away, disappearing into the shadows with Alastair. A fissure cracked down the side of the walls, the tunnels echoed with falling stones.

Castiel threw himself onto the ground to avoid a shower of rocks and then, because there was no time, dragged Dean into the nearest open tunnel. It barely fit both of them and the air was filled with dust. Then all the lights disappeared except perhaps a pinpoint in the distance. Castiel moved them deeper and further in until the pinpoint grew bigger, the light brighter, and the journey slower and more painful. The tunnel seemed endless, the stones countless. He was no longer sacrosanct. They no longer had the protection of the innocent: the trade had been made. Small sharp teeth nipped at the soft skin of his hands, his back, his belly, the back of his knees. Still, he pushed the rocks away, shoving at them until he managed to make the opening big enough to fit a man.

Castiel knelt beside Dean, clutching at his side. The various small aches and pains were stealing his breaths, filling all the soft spaces around his heart that it felt as if it no longer beat. He felt as if he was dying, as if just beyond there was another darkness as absolute and as awful as the faceless light. It frightened him.

"Let us go," whispered Castiel and he laid his head against Dean's and his lips against his cheek. With the last measure of his strength he dragged them both out and he closed his eyes against the light.

-=-=

"What is that?"

"A man? Two men?"

"That is not men. Look at them. Look at that one."

"Which one? Is that one?"

Castiel blinked. The man in front of him blinked. He lifted an arm, the man likewise. Everything about him was astonishingly golden, as if light was pouring out of his eyes and skin. A halo crowned his head.

"Who are you?"

The other man opened and closed his mouth, then frowned. A narrow line appeared on his smooth brow.

"Is he talking to himself?"

"Is the other dead? How can it be dead?"

Castiel turned his head and saw a cluster of small imps standing a small distance away, chatting. Dean was laying beside him, his chest rising and falling evenly.

"He is not dead," Castiel said softly, though he didn't know whether it was a response to them or a reassurance to himself, "merely sleeping."

"You are two, then," one of the imps attempted. "We don't know. We are new. There was such a quake. Ooh, such a quake." He shivered happily; it seemed infectious, for they all began to bounce a little: "We're so new, we have nothing to do until we saw you."

"Who is that behind me, then?"

"You, you." The answer made no sense, but Castiel stood up and saw the man's face had been disfigured, his expression ugly. He reached out and tapped against the metal. It was the golden object on which he had knocked under the instruction of the blind creature. He was looking at his reflection for the first time and if he stepped a little sideway, he would be able to see his face. He noted the limbs were intact. He did not need to look at the face. They were borrowed, though of course, he had already seen it when he woke up here.

"Who are you? Who is he? Were you the ones who rattled the cage?"

"And what if we were," asked Castiel warily, then watched with astonishment as the imps fell prostrate in front of him.

"Then we thank you, o lord, for you have made him angry and through his anger we have come to be. We offer whatever you desire-"

And because Castiel had neither soul nor innocence, only the isolated angelic resolve which had threatened Lucifer, he said, reckless: "Lead me out of Nowhere."

-=-=

Dean dreamed. He was in a forest where the leaves glinted with spider webs and each dead branch was gargantuan next to his shoe.

It was a stray memory. He had been very young and John had left him inside the Impala, except it had just been car at the time. He hadn't wanted to take Dean with him but the babysitter had her hands full with one sick toddler already. Dean was almost asleep until something bumped against the door. From above the ledge of the window, he saw a tuft of white fur. He had slipped out from the other side and tried to find his father, quietly. He was remembering not to call out as it would be dangerous to draw attention and was something he must never ever do.

His father would find him. His father would be angry. He had not stayed where he was bidden to stay. He caught glimpse of their flashlight in the distance. One of the light bulbs had cracked, then the light moved away. Perhaps he would be left here as punishment. Disobedient soldiers were no use to anyone.

He was surprised to hear his own name. The syllables rose above the forest sounds. He tried to answer, but when he opened his mouth, he started crying.

-=-=

Castiel did not recognize the path. It was not the way he came.

"Can you fly?" they asked Castiel once. They had never seen men. Or if they had or were man or men once upon a time, they didn't remember. Could they remember angels?

"I will kill you if I do." They didn't ask again. He had never been a proselytizing angel.

His clothes were rags. His body was bloody, his charge unconscious and his guides imps who marched in step and stumbled in unison. They hiked upwards a long winding stair, the macadam steps ancient and crumbling. The imps huffed and puffed the stale air. The ascent, steep and spiraling upwards, was otherwise covered in a thick layer of dust. That it was there at all was strange. Castiel sometimes wondered if the brief flickers he saw from the corner of his eyes were other eyes, but he fixed his thoughts on the man he carried and tried, with difficulty, not to notice what was around him.

Still, beneath the broken stones sometimes he saw glints of coiled metal, half-buried and multi-faceted, glinting faintly under the perpetual half-shadow. He did not ask what they were or why sometimes he espied the harsh lines of Enochian scratched deep into the metal. It had very little to do with his determination to escape. No single-mindedness could have failed to be distracted seeing his own name scattered like bizarre artifacts on a journey new to him or occasional footprint the exact dimensions as his own. James Novak would never tread this road; he was blessed before his birth; his death, too, would be blessed. The angels had always kept faith with their vessels. Castiel would not betray him.

Castiel did not to wonder or consider that he might have been here before or would be here again. If he had been here before, it meant he had failed so that now he had to return. But if it meant he would eventually return, perhaps it meant they would finally breach the gates of Hell and the war with Heaven would end in its triumph. And the sword he abandoned and perhaps his very bones beneath his feet, were mere evidence of an unavoidable fatality.

"What are you smiling at?" one of the small creatures asked.

Castiel had been unaware he smiled. "That you should know the way and help me."

"Oh, it's nothing," the lead imp said, "We all know the way. It's nothing important. We had to leave before he came anyways."

"Who's he?"

"The Blind. He chases us all away before long. He didn't see you."

But of course he did, Castiel remembered, but how could he see? He voiced the question.

"He likes his reflection so much, so golden and so beautiful and so he had to stay. He wondered in one day, gross and old, and grew jealous of what he could have been or what he had been. He cried. He languished. He lamented. It was so long ago we don't even know the meaning of his words, but it became his to watch. And though he try to sew his own eyes closed, he would tear out the stitches every night. Oh, but I think we remember that he was beautiful- All who came here were." The words ended, they grew quiet, altogether wistful, as if they had not expected to remember.

Castiel remembered the wizened the face and would not call it beautiful but this time, he kept silent. But of course, it was too late. Now he remembered, the reflection of himself seemed emblazoned in his memory and it had been connected and given a quality: beautiful, they said. And he had been, too -- the wide startled eyes and the wiry body -- it was fragile humanity clothing angelic grace, Heaven's sword, clothing Castiel, a thought of God, lustrous in gold. What a thought...

They stopped abruptly, still far from the sky, but below them was a murky haze. Before them was another wall. He stared at the rough surface.

"It is not here," he said, toneless.

"The way out of Nowhere," they answered, pointing at the solid wall.

"It is a wall, an end." He had raised his voice. A shout answered from somewhere around them. Castiel thought if he stepped down perhaps he would find himself merely three steps above the ground where he left, trapped in an infinite loop.

"Shh, it is all the same," they said, sotto voce, "Nowhere is a crack in the ground, a blight on a blade of grass, or a speck of dust. It is Nowhere. It is the deepest part of Hell, the smallest part of the world, an atom filled with the worst accidents."

Accidents. Unexpected. Things beyond the plan. In the great plan of Heaven, they were nothing. Already, dread was pooling inside Castiel, but he shouldn't trust creatures of Hell, even new ones. Their natures were marked by a thousand different sins from a thousand different dead.

"We wouldn't have existed without you," they added, "Whatever you had wished, you threatened our prince."

Castiel had been willing to stay in Dean Winchester's place. The archangels had planned it but they had not known that even soulless, angels could possess a will other than Heaven's or act beyond the laws they understood to govern the cosmos. Lucifer knew the freedom of chaos, but standing in front of the terminus of his journey, Castiel didn't. He only saw that he had failed because he had caught the attention of the Devil himself and was the force that brought to being wicked things that would plague the world.

Time existed at all times and at all places except where the angels weren't allowed to tread. Thus, no soldier knew the outcome of the wars with Hell. Castiel himself had not known what had been implicit in his order until now- you shall know the end of celestial justice; in your long life, you had known nothing and fought against nothing. In Nowhere the worst ruled. Out of Nowhere came only lies and perfidies. And yet into Nowhere the Host pressed, swords raised, valiant.

The images of the dead flashed across Castiel's mind: his family bloodied and burning on the ageless fields, the promised happiness that never came to fruit, the incomplete goodbyes, the unfinished stories. He remembered the gates of Hell, still shiny inside despite the long sieges and the long empty roads inside, each perversion as self-important as ever, as if no angel had ever won a battle. And finally, he thought of his own name buried deep within this realm when he thought he had never walked along its roads; and he thought of the golden image of himself: four-limbed and two-eyed. Shame overcame him. He wanted to hide. The grief was intolerable. He pressed Dean Winchester closer against himself as if the man could staunch the dolor of the millennia of soldiering against phantasmagoria.

-=-=

Dean stirred, almost awake.

"Is it raining," was his first thought and the second, "I'm suffocating."

He coughed. A shadow fell over him. He opened his eyes and could neither blink nor look away. His fear was a dead thing even as the air around him screamed and eddied, rushing past. Dean had no energy to be afraid. He felt as if he had fought forty werewolves in forty states. He was merely dreaming. He closed his eyes. He had been sleeping in the open and a cloud was passing over the moon. There were countless stars in the sky.

-=-=

It was the difference between one thought and another. Hell was Everywhere and Nowhere; along every journey, every road, and every step was the possibility of oblivion. A soul could be worn down by the endless reiteration of the world or by the instruments of demons at their racks until only dust remained, as unconscious and as vague as the primordial earth. Dust speaks no suspicions and voices no question. Nothing mattered. It could be anything, easily coalesced and shaped by the moisture of a careful breath or the spittle from an spatted invective.

At the end of Castiel's journey in Nowhere, he doubted. And in doubting, he gave definition to what he believed. In demanding answers, his questions gave limit and shape to where he was. In recognizing the inconsequential simulacrum of Nowhere, he was free from its falseness, from Everywhere, from Hell itself.

-=-=

His body was falling away, his grace unfurling. He was wrapped around Dean's body, but Dean grew weightless and Castiel's eyes grew dim as his vision returned so the unaccustomed shadow cleaving to him seemed at first dwimmering. He struggled ineffectually even as the glory of Heaven began to close. There was a clamoring in his thoughts. He could make out no words, but he was frantic.

He had lost Dean Winchester again. Had he fallen? He searched and turned away from the procession that was surely coming to greet him.

"You have the Righteous Man," they announced and drew their swords, approaching rapidly. "Return him to us."

Castiel was certain now that Dean Winchester was still with him because they could not be mistaken, but it was too soon. He could not be a vessel. At least, not yet.

At this, they hesitated, as if Castiel asked them a question to which they did not know the answer. Castiel was nonplussed. He had been alone for so long he had not realized his thoughts were no longer his own.

"Who are you?" they asked him.

Castiel answered them and they laughed, but they sheathed their swords, the bright flames temporarily dimmed.

"Castiel it is then," one of them said. Castiel did not recognize him, but there was lightening in the arch of his shadow. "It will be Castiel." He turned toward his companions. The thought echoed inside Castiel's own head, but it seemed as if he was hearing it from a great distance.

"Go then," the angel told him, the edge of command was unmistakable. "I am Raphael, I will wait for you."

Castiel turned away from them, speeding in the opposite direction.

He must remake Dean Winchester and so, return him to God, to the visible mysteries of the world, the impossible grass and the improbable sky He made. And then, Castiel and Dean Winchester would truly see each other in this prodigious reality. He had made a promise to Dean Winchester. He did not dare to remember it, but it had been woven into his being as surely as his faith.

All was quiet around them. There was no pursuit. Castiel had eluded his siblings.

The trees were whispering as Castiel slowly disrobed and disarmed. His wingtips grazed the surface of the lake, the waters circling outwards in delicate ripples. Carefully, he placed Dean Winchester's soul onto the bank. It shone brighter than the sun gliding overhead and appeared to be made of the same flowing particles of light.

If Castiel still had lungs, if Castiel still had a mouth, if he still required breath, they would be devoted to the soft exhalation of wonder that he felt. And it was his own. Even the music of Heaven couldn't overcome the sharp edge of the Godly command. It pierced through the veil and gave Castiel joy so he could touch that naked soul and gather together the shreds of shadow and scattering lights to give it mass and a shape for human eyes to see, human hands to touch.


	8. Chapter 8

"Who are you?"

From the complicated whorls on his fingertips to the easy line of his instep, Dean Winchester mostly consisted of the empty space of matter -- electrons spinning very quickly and distantly from the heavy artifacts of nucleii-- but Castiel had paused, quite unwittingly, in his work, distracted. Light, indolent, rolled over and into it, gave it hue and definition.

"You know me," Castiel answered after a moment, startled by the resemblance of the man under the sun to the man in Hell.

Dean laughed. He sat up, then idly skimmed his hands on the grass. "No, I mean, yes, but it seems I should know your name."

"I am Castiel." He had a voice that could shatter stones and twist metal, but Dean heard merely a man’s rasped words, soft and low.

"What are you?"

"An angel of our Lord."

Dean fell silent. “Angels don’t exist,” he said at length. “Demons, ghosts, vampires, werewolves, witches, those exist.” The lines around his mouth hardened. “Angels don’t exist,” he insisted.

“How do I appear to you?” asked Castiel, curious.

The man narrowed his eyes, then he blinked and his eyes widened. He reached out, then withdrew his hand. It had not passed through, but neither had it met flesh.

"You are not kidding, but you still might be something else.” Dean turned away. "I'm sorry, it’s too late. I need to go," he said. "I need to go find Sam." Before Castiel could speak, Dean scrambled to his feet and took off.

-=-=

The trees were moving. They were following him. The leaves were whispering and the long grass was curling around him. The whole world was conspiring against him to stay when all he wanted to do was find his brother and continue his life. Dean was running away from Castiel and Castiel gave chase.

In the panic, Castiel forgot he had no legs. He overtook Dean among the trees. The sun moved across the sky, disappearing into the horizon. Dean disappeared into the forest. The sun rose. Castiel wandered back to where Dean started and went to the ground, angry with himself as the sky flushed scarlet with another sunset.

Castiel was once again alone with his thoughts with the command he still had not yet completely carried out. He did not understand it. The world was not infinitely large and Dean Winchester was directionless. Surely he would stop, consider, and retrace his footsteps to where Castiel was. He wished for the body of his vessel. For the first time, he wished not to be alarming. He wished to sooth and to comfort as he did not so long ago.

But this world, though it tolerated death and all the curved paths it might lead, would not tolerate the act of wearing guises of other things, especially when the music of Heaven was playing like a particularly loud and obnoxious fiddle in his head when he merely wanted to listen for Dean’s voice and see Dean’s face and return that last part of Dean’s self to him.

In desperation, Castiel walked, working himself into the memory of what he had been like. It was his memory, after all, of himself as he had experienced the agony upon the rack. He remembered the shapes of the muscles of the legs, the sensations of walking on grass, mud, concrete and glass. The gibbous moon was spilling messy shadows onto the ground, every branch hinting at an arm and every leaf implying the stray angle of a silhouette.

Just as the sky was brightening, Castiel came upon Dean Winchester in a clearing. He was asleep, hair and skin gilded by sunlight. Castiel looked at him for a while then laid down beside him, careful not to touch and yet unable to stay so far away that he could not feel the soft breaths against his face.

For he had a face, now, and it looked very much like that of James Novak as he would on earth, except with wilder hair- that came with crawling in cramped underground tunnels.

-=-=

And as Dean slept, Castiel whispered the last piece of Dean’s soul from deep within himself.

Dean woke up afraid. "Am I dead?" He looked at Castiel. "Am I dreaming? You look," he closed his eyes briefly, squeezing them shut so tightly that wrinkles fanned out from the corner of his eyes, then opened them again. “A lot better.”

“You are neither dead nor dreaming and I have told you before, ”

“Wait, I’m not dead?” Dean looked down at himself. He was clothed. He was not bleeding. He stood and took a few stomping steps. Nothing rattled and nothing hurt.

“What happened? The last thing I remember, you--” he stopped. Castiel’s wings were visible, the feathers white and smooth and gleaming except for a place near the shoulder.

“I lifted you from Hell.”

“So, you are an angel,” Dean said dubiously. “I see you got the halo and the wings and I don’t remember them or you being so,” he gestured in Castiel’s general direction, “golden. But then, things were weird there and here, I suppose. My life in summary. You brought me back from Hell and tuned me up.” He smoothed his hands against each other then ran them down his face, neck, his torso, his arms. “Or at least, try to. I feel pretty good actually, but I think you missed a spot.”

“I-” Castiel closed his mouth.

“Did you sign your work?” finished Dean, peering at the scar on his arm from an awkward angle. “That is your hand, right? It looks like it would fit.” He flexed his hand. “I think I still feel something there. What will happen if you touched it? Will you try?”

"You are not a theological experiment," said Castiel, suddenly bitter. He didn’t move. Dean Winchester was on display before him, the Righteous Man, Michael’s vessel. He should be pleased. He wasn’t.

"What?" Dean was still looking at the scar. He was remarkably free of scars elsewhere. That seemed to be his only one.

"I did as I had been commanded," Castiel continued, half to himself.

“Castiel,” said Dean patiently. “Give me your hand.” But Castiel didn’t move. He reached for Castiel’s hand himself and it fitted neatly; the slender palm, the longer fingers, the gentle contours of that relaxed open hand covered the angry looking mark. The skin tingled where he held Castiel’s hand beneath his, that was all. “It is all right, you see. I’d rather that it’s you. You came for me and you stayed there with me. I think, I should say thank you. I owe you.”

“But I had made you a promise.”

“You did,” Dean said quietly.

“I have not yet fulfilled it,” Castiel reminded him. “But I will, as long as you trust me there will be-” Dean was frowning.

“How did we get out? What happened? I had you on the rack, I was torturing you.” He swore. “Then what? He let us go, just like that?”

“You didn’t torture me,” Castiel corrected him. “I went willingly. I had borne nothing you didn’t bear and you came with me, willingly, when it was time for us to depart.”

“I thought you made a deal with him...”

“Angels don’t make deals. Things are or are not. We make promises and fulfill them for our Father made the promises for humanity and his thoughts give us being.”

“Pretty black and white world you guys got,” said Dean. He looked at where he was still holding Castiel’s hand and released it. Castiel’s arm dropped back to his side. It hung there, slightly awkward. “So, where am I? What is this place? I mean, it seems I should know it, but really, it could be anywhere. The view’s nice. I’m sure I saw a lake somewhere. It’s like somewhere I once saw in a dream but you said I’m not dreaming.”

“You are not dreaming, but men have called this place limbo before though limbo doesn’t really exist. It is closer to the human world than either Heaven or Hell.”

“So, some sort of extended human world where we can’t usually go? But you are here and I am still here and I know what limbo is, so what are we waiting for?”

“For you to return. I would show you the way. You would fight again.” They would walk together and Castiel would part with Dean Winchester. The thought weighed uneasily in Castiel’s mind, but he could wait until Dean’s mortal life ends and they would see each other. What was time to an angel? He looked at Dean expectantly.

“No,” Dean answered. This time, he did not run or even move away. He stood very close to Castiel and seemed to move closer still. He lowered his face and Castiel’s eyes were caught in the gaze. He had been wrong. This Dean Winchester did not at all resemble the man he met in Hell. That man had no fury. “Tell me why you came to find me and how you left the scar and why you allowed yourself to be tortured, for my sake, you said. The demons,” he choked on the word. “They didn’t like you, but they couldn’t harm you.”

“I had been commanded,” Castiel replied, bewildered. “But why won’t you return to the world? You wanted it.”

“Who are you, Castiel?” Dean asked. The name sounded odd in his mouth, almost vicious. “If there are angels who follow the command of God and whom the demons fear, then tell me, do angels walk into Hell every day?”

“No. I am a soldier. I was following an order.” He grew desperate. “It had been mine since the beginning of time. Why do you refuse to return now?”

“I made a deal so my brother could live. Of course it would’ve been better if I could brought him back another way, but there wasn’t, so I made the deal. It was a sacrifice, of course it was, but it meant something that I could do that.” Dean paused. A shadow passed his face, but it was gone quickly. “I will have nightmares about it later, but, there’s only one angel in Hell, Castiel.” Dean finally moved away, but his eyes were unflinching. “Who do I have on my shoulder?”

It seemed as if the sky was falling, rushing toward him. Distantly, he heard Dean shouting after him.

-=-=

Of course Castiel came back. Dean didn’t stir when Castiel returned and stood by his side as if he had been expecting him. Castiel could not bring himself to speak.

“So, I’ve been giving things some thought,” Dean began, finally turning to look at him. He had been swimming, droplets of water clung to his skin. “You said you are a soldier.”

“I am.” Castiel was wary.

“So, soldiers have weapons. Where is yours? Or do you do a laying on of hands?”

Wordlessly, Castiel brought out his blade. It was almost human dimension, but not quite, flickers of flame still danced along its edge. Dean looked at it then looked away.

“You couldn’t use that in hell, I suppose, cut me down, cut them down.”

“I could not. My true form burned you and I am only one angel. Dean, you still died and suffered. ”

Dean flinched at the reminder. “I didn’t meant to make you angry, but I don’t want to return. I want to stay here. Look at it.” He pointed at the lake, the limpid waters glittering. “And it’s quiet. So it’s missing some things, but I figure we can make a vacation out of it unless you want your revenge now.”

“My revenge?”

“I tortured you. I accused you of being your enemy. You are angry with me. You said angels aren’t about areas of gray, and-” Dean paused. He lowered his eyes.“I owe you.”

“I am angry with you.” Castiel was truthful. “There will be no peace until your death and we make promises.”

“And yet I must live,” Dean mused. "Do it now," Dean said. He bent one knee at a time, leaned forwards and placed both of his hands on the ground. Castiel looked at the golden bow of his naked back, the careful dip of his head, and wanted to avert his eyes.

"Please," Dean was saying, "if I am alive now and freed from Hell, then kill me."

As if in a trance, Castiel lifted his sword with one hand. There was no weight to it, but the blade caught the glare of the sun and a bright spot was dancing on the emerald grass. Castiel's hand was shaking. He tightened his grip then brought the sword down, his eyes on the vulnerable jut of neck.

Dean was still waiting, his fingers digging into the earth. It was the thought of mud in those nails that brought Castiel back to himself.

"Stand up," Castiel said. Dean did not, so Castiel threw down the sword beside him.

"I have had my revenge. I am satisfied. We will wait."

Dean's head turned, but he remained on the ground.

"Castiel, kill me," he said.

"No."

"I thought I was ready to die. I did die, but I wasn't strong enough for what came afterwards. But you came, you made me ready. I am ready to die now."

"Then stand up and look at me when you say these things. Stand up and face me, Dean Winchester. I went to Hell to find you; I gathered you from the remains of yourself and lifted you up and renewed every hair, every bone on your body. Your life ended the day you traded your soul to a crossroad demon. This new life does not belong to you alone. Dean Winchester, stand up and face me." Castiel’s voice grew louder.

"And what? Swear my obedience? To whom? You?"

"To Heaven."

"So now instead of being at the beck and call of everyone every terrorized by a ghost or a vampire, I'll be heaven's slave? No thanks."

"Not a slave. A soldier, Dean Winchester. You are a soldier as I am. We obey our orders."

"Well then. Yes sir, but no thanks sir. I'm done. I'm out. I'm tired of fighting everyone else’s war for them." Dean still hadn’t gotten up. He wasn’t even looking at Castiel. He was speaking to the grass. Blood was drying on his ears.

"Even death will not let you rest. God's command is carried out through out all of creation. You have escaped Hell, you would not escape Heaven. Nothing will hide you against what must be."

"Dean Winchester alive and kicking until he's deemed fit to die? Then what? Heaven or the oblivion I thought existed.”

"Alive, yes and kicking only if you wish it. And you will not die. I will-" Castiel corrected himself, "It is not permitted for you to die." When Dean did not speak, he softened and lowered himself onto the grass until his mouth was at the level of Dean's ears. "Come with me, Dean Winchester," he whispered. Or I shall go with you, thought Castiel, but he did not dare it to speak it aloud.

“You have said that before,” Dean said.


	9. Chapter 9

Castiel pressed his mouth against Dean's ear. “Trust me,” he whispered for the soul beyond this body, utterly without caution. Blood stained his lips and the acrid tang of it lingered in his mouth.

Dean’s collapsed onto the ground. Eventually, he turned his head and looked at Castiel. His eyes were lowered as if squinting against the sun. “Did we make a deal in Hell or had it been a genuine angelic promise?” he asked. “I’m very tired. I will have nightmares. Worse ones, at any rate. And then, according to you, my nightmare will become real because there are places where even angels don't go and I went there. If I choose not to go with you...” He wavered.

“Then there will be no beginning and no ending for us. There is a plan and a purpose for you that is changing everything about Heaven. You are right, there should be only one angel in Hell, but there wasn’t and that had been my part and the role will be finished, soon.”

Dean rubbed his face. “I think I know better than to rely on your sense of time. It felt as if we spent forever. What does it mean to the angels whether I return or not? Why me, Castiel? I can't be the only person who sold their soul to demons.”

“But you are Michael's and with you we could win the war.” The vast battlefields before the impenetrable gates of Hell and his own footprints, already ancient, on those last steps in Nowhere rose in Castiel's minds, unbidden. “It is a very long war. We want it to end. It is the will of God.”

“And all I have to do is swear my obedience to Heaven? Do they think I will join Hell's side?”

He did, but God's plans did not require understanding. “We know you love your brother,” said Castiel instead.

Dean snorted. “I don't do everything he asks. I don't obey him.”

“But you died for him without him asking. You knew he would return if there's a way.”

Dean fell silent. The wind picked up. Goosebumps appeared on his skin. Crossing his arms over his chest, “Stop looking at me like that. I wasn't trying to drown myself,” he said. “Castiel? What about you? What will you do once I go back?”

“I will return to my garrison," Castiel answered. "It is on earth," he added.

"What? Are there other planets that require angels?" Dean was being flippant. "What do little green men hunt? Are there angels with green wings?" The branches were swaying. Handfuls of leaves blew past them. “I will never see you again as long as I live,” said Dean. He reached up and plucked a leaf that had become entangled amidst the feathers of Castiel's wing. He stared at it in his hand. The edges of leaf blade were curled and still burning, but the glow of the ember faded and the leaf turned black and scattered he was left merely holding onto the stalk. He took a step toward Castiel. Alarmed, Castiel took a step back. "I will not even be able to recognize you," Dean said. He leaned closer. The air around Castiel was burning.

"I will find you," Castiel said. "And we will remember." He smiled. "Whatever you wish." Everything would be unspoiled and unaltered by time.

Grinning, Dean leaned forward, but Castiel turned his head sharply at the last moment. He was being summoned.

"Quick," he said, casting his eyes to the sky, "swear yourself to God.” Dean hesitated. "Swear it," Castiel demanded, growing more horrified.

"I swear-" Dean began, but it was too late. The Host was coming.

-=-=

The lake dried; the grass wilted; trees caught fire; roasting flesh screamed into the air.

Zachariah's herald was contemptuous. Zachariah himself arrived with honey on his teeth, sharp and white and exposed between the red shine of his lips.

“You are late, Castiel. We thought we'd send Uriel after you, but we feared- Don't look so surprised. Yes, we feared that he would not simply be, what is that word they use? Convincing, yes, convincing. How odd, how weird it is that I have to use words for you. This tongue thing seem so, inadequate.”

“Who is he?” asked Dean, gasping. Castiel had stepped in front of him when it seemed as if the entire sky descended in an instant and sucked out all the air. He searched the ground, casting about for a weapon. Already, green new shoots were emerging from the blackened soil. “What is he?”

The head turned. Once of the faces opened its mouth. “Who is that who dares to speak without permission?”

“I don't need permission to speak,” protested Dean before Castiel could stop him.

“Ah, there's the lost lamb, so you did find him,” Zachariah's eyes wondered up and down his person. “The expression, I believe, is 'like finds like' though that is so human, so limiting.”

Castiel tensed. “He is my brother, Zachariah.” He turned to Dean and watched his eyes widen. “They're all my brothers.”

“Now then,” Zachariah continued casually, as if he had merely dropped in to visit. Perhaps he had. After all, he was family, but the expressions on the other soldiers were as blank and as pitiless as the sun and Castiel's mouth had firmed into a thin, hard line. “You look good as new. Michael will be pleased.”

There was a touch, as light as a breeze, that suddenly ran down his chest. Dean was so surprised at the sensation that he nearly jumped. “Angel or no angel, watch it,” he growled.

“Still got some of that fire in him, I see,” Zacharia commented. “Pity you let it stay, and I certainly can't choose what happened. But Castiel, Castiel..” The head began to sway side-to-side though the body stayed still as if rooted to the ground, giving the impression of an inverted pendulum. “We didn't come for him. You've been away a while and we are growing concerned, so concerned that we were even worrying, fearing.” With each word, the swaying slowed while the voice grew deeper and thicker. “When we learned that you have returned. We wondered that you did not answer our questions.” The angel pushed at Castiel, who staggered. Dean moved, but before his eyes, Castiel seemed to be fading while his wings were growing whiter until they seemed almost incandescent. “We are now wondering why he is speaking. Why is he not where he should be? Why are you still here?”

“I did not think-” Castiel said. “Stay away from me, Dean.”

“He cannot be allowed to remember. Where is free-will if he remembers? He must place his trust in Our Father and no one else,” Zachariah announced. “Ponder on the consequences. We've heard your silences and your prayers and we find them,” he paused, searching for the next word, “incorrect.”

“I held onto Dean Winchester and lifted him from perdition.”

“It wasn't necessary,” Zachariah said, dismissive. “Nothing that happens there counts. It suffers from an absence of Our Father. He only cares that His plans are carried out. The consequences are not your concern.”

Dean cursed. “Then your god is mad. I can't work for God or anyone else as an empty shell. Free-will, right?”

Zachariah stared at him blankly for a moment, then burst into laughter.

“Oh, very good. Very good. My God is my god, not yours yet, I take it. Very fancy pun for you, Dean Winchester. Did Castiel teach you Enochian... among other things?” All of his eyes stared fixedly at the scar on Dean's shoulder as if noticing it for the first time. “How did you...” He faltered. “Castiel, return him to earth,” he ordered, curtly. “You've been far too inventive. Return to the garrison as you've been instructed. We will wait for you there.

-=-=

“Zachariah's right. You cannot remember this,” Castiel said, and his voice was infinitely sad. “But I could not bear the thought not to see you awake here.”

Young grass had already covered the scorched ground. Dean picked at them absently, letting bits of green to be carried in the air. The golden cast of Castiel's features were fading. The shine on the fabric of his skin seemed dulled. He was becoming a shadow of himself. Even his wings, which had seemed to be burning a moment ago, had faded into something like a suggestion, their existence merely a subtle disturbance in the air. He was becoming, Dean thought, human.

Dean closed his eyes. When he opened them again. Castiel was still there-- dark haired and blue-eyed-- rather unlike the being that called Zachariah his brother and yet all too reminiscent of the man who had come to find him in Hell and lived in a house and watched and stayed and suffered with him, the only bearable memory of Hell, perhaps even the only important one.

“Why do you look like this?” he asked. “Your brothers look different.”

“Zachariah's always been whimsical,” Castiel said. “But this form, this body, is meant for me.” He hesitated. “And for you.”

Dean laughed. The amulet on his chest was shining like gold. He lifted an eyebrow. “A man could get the wrong impression from that.”

“It doesn't make it less true,” Castiel demurred.

“I know.” They grew silent at the reminder. The idleness was coming to an end.

“There will be less nightmares,” Castiel said, finally.

Dean closed his eyes.

-=-=

Castiel had expected to rebury Dean Winchester's body himself.

He had not expected the angelic inquisition.

When Castiel heard the summons, so loud that it whitened his vision, he gritted his teeth and still bore Dean's body to the grave his brother had made. He threw shovelfuls of dirt until the coffin was revealed then he placed Dean Winchester tenderly inside it. And between the moment he entombed Dean Winchester and Heaven withdrew his mortal raiment, pressed his finger against the bow of Dean's upper lip and quieted the furious echoes of Heaven and Hell and the time lived impossibly between them.

-=-=

The first time Dean Winchester asked, Castiel hurried to meet him, still unaccustomed to his vessel's body, each movement deliberate and awkward. James Novak had not been called until long in adulthood.

“Why does your vessel bleed?” Uriel asked, assessing the bullet holes and the rip on the coat, resentful to have a captain so changed and yet so unaware of the change. “Why should you meet Dean Winchester when he summons you? Or regardless whether he summons you. He is merely a man.”

“I lifted him from perdition,” Castiel said. “He should know.” It was middle of the night. Dean was sleeping and yet Castiel wanted to wake him. The compulsion was almost frightening in its intensity.

“What should he know about perdition?” Uriel asked. The muscles of Castiel's human face shifted curiously though he gave no answer. He grew stranger and closer to the Winchesters until one day Uriel realized that Castiel had no knowledge of the apocalypse or the rest that waited for them on the other side. “How could you not know the sacrifices we make? Or what it is for? What does all this mean for you?” he wondered. Castiel heard him though it was unspoken. He looked up from the ground, startled, as if a recollection was percolating across his mind, but Uriel never finished the thought.

Still, afterward, Castiel caught the faint echo of a decree, passed so long ago and so far away from earth that the story was barely remembered and almost an allegory. All the archangels together had offered an angel, successful after his mission, a choice behind the veil and that his fate had neither been a reprimand nor a punishment but a choice and some whispered, a reward. Since free-will remained the privilege of humanity who could know of both Heaven and Hell but Lucifer was the only angel who could know Hell, would the angel remain in the company of his brothers or count himself among the favorites of God?

-=-=

Castiel was standing too close to Dean in the bathroom. Dean was adjusting his collar, cinching his tie, and introducing him to food.

These things, Castiel saw as the trials of his faith, though skin and muscle and lips remembered as he was gradually reawakened in this body and as the sensations took hold of him and an old longing stirred his blood. There was some vague memory as compelling as a command from God, an unspeakable delight, a mysterious joy in the simplicity of being able to see, to hear, to touch.

“I just thought I would sit here, quietly,” he said to Dean Winchester on his last night on earth. The air was dusty, the house rundown, but comforting, a sort of unreasonable nostalgia. He did not know why.


	10. Chapter 10

The wingtips appeared in the middle of the lake, grazing the surface and leaving a rippling scar before disappearing.

A moment later, the cattails and the rushes beside the picnic areas bent at the force of the waves washing over them.

"Look, look!" A boy rushed to pull at his father's sleeve. His father woke from his doze and said, "Yes, it's very beautiful. Isn't being on holiday nice?" then closed his eyes again.

But the boy got up from where he had been sitting and approached the edge of the lake until his sandals squelched in the silt. Shielding his eyes with his hand, he squinted into the distance but the glint he saw in the middle of the lake was still there, hinting at something wonderful. He waded in until the ripples lapped at his knees and the bright spot in the middle of the water grew sharper.

It looked like a sword, suspended in the liquid as if floating vertically and being held upwards by an invisible hand. In the early afternoon, the world was quiet and still, even the hum of the bees disappeared. The water was cool against his legs and his shorts were sticking to his skin. There was a magical quality to the air, as if he had stepped into a story. The boy drew closer, his feet on the edge at the bottom of the lake where another step would have taken him where it would be too deep to stand.

A hand broke the surface, followed by an arm in a wet sleeve, a shoulder, and a man with bright awful eyes. The sword was the head of a spear, but the light reflecting off it looked like fire, flames reaching towards him, the heat searing even from a distance. The boy turned and scrambled away, splashing. His parents, hearing the noise, woke and started shouting at the sight of a man, trailing blood on his chest, walking with a long silver knife.

The wheels of the car scored a long gash on the rough mix of gravel and sand. Castiel sat down on the abandoned blanket, still holding the sword and took a long shuddering breath before coughing up lake water mixed with blood, the violence and duration contorting his muscles and forcing him to his knees. He closed his eyes against the brightly patterned blanket and the silver weapon still clutched in his hand; the screams had died, there was only the rhythmic sound of tides in his ears.

-=-=

"Where do you think Cas is?" Sam asked, glancing at the clock.

"How should I know?"

"Truth be told, I'm kind of worried. I mean, we don't know what happens to becoming a banishing sigil. He wasn't very clear on the point."

"He's an angel, he can take care of himself. Kind of demonstrated that point on me." Dean said and got up from the table.

"Against four other angels?"

"If he say he can do it, he can do it. He did." Dean was rummaging in the fridge, his jacket still bearing the stains of the alleyway.

"Will he come back?"

"It's always been just us." Dean said, but Sam had already left and he was speaking in the dark. He should be thinking of Adam or Sam or even John, but he thought of Castiel, an arm's length's away, directing Dean to hold the small mirror still.

"It's just blood," he had said, carving that body.

-=-=

Castiel was walking alone in the woods. His body felt heavy. He could feel every contraction of muscle, every shift of bone and each drip of blood that escaped the slow knitting of skin. He was not feeling like himself. Time was moving very slowly.

“It's been a while, hasn't it? A wonder to see you here, all alone.”

“Demon,” he said, tried to infuse his voice with something like threat.

“You stand on a cross-road, angel.” Crowley began smiling. “What will it be, then?”

“I'm not looking to trade anything,” Castiel said.

“No, I got that now. Didn't get that the first time around. Suspected, you see, but I didn't know. Couldn't know,” the demon said. “Good job with Dean Winchester. It's not what I expected at all, actually.”

“What?”

“Name's Crowley, though they'd mentioned me by name, being the giver of Colt and the bullets. Never could account for the lack of brains in that family, but you, I thought you'd know the identify of whom you spy.” The demon, absurdly, walked closer until Castiel's sword hand burned and the sword, though reduced to its earthly dimensions, grew heavy in his pocket. “You look rather different. Pained,” he said, flicking his eyes up and down Castiel's person, “scarred. Grown-up now, I suppose, though I thought we weren't suppose to allow that sort of thing. Look at me, this one's rather new,” he said, brushing off an imaginary lint off his cuff, “but it's been a century at least.”

“You have met this vessel as a child?” asked Castiel, nonplussed.

Crowley raised an eyebrow. “Met is not quite the word I would use. Don't even know the tyke. Suppose they didn't let you remember.”

“Remember what?” It was never a good idea to ask a demon a question. If Castiel were in Heaven, he wouldn't have, but that was all gone, now.

“Well, that could be part of it. I'm thinking more along the lines of journeying through Hell as an angel. Now, that I'm thinking makes more sense. A good plan. Positively diabolical.” He continued blithely, ”You came looking for Dean Winchester. I led you to him.”

“That is a lie.” Quick as a flash, Castiel had Crowley by the throat. It was a delicate hold and the sword was unnecessary against a mere demon. Nonetheless, effective.

“I have no motivation.” For some reason, Crowley appeared upset.

“The Colt didn't work. Lucifer lives.”

“I didn't know! I told you before, in Hell, remember, angel, in Hell,” Crowley said, rather loudly when he saw the sword descending. “You came looking for Dean Winchester wearing this same meatsuit, except he was a boy. A little lost boy, looking to relieve a man in damnation and I helped you. Do you remember how you got Dean Winchester out?”

“I- He wasn't.” Castiel didn't remember. He lowered his sword slightly. Crowley didn't move.

“I told you, angel.” Crowley said, irritated, “I was your guide. Granted, it was unawares, but I regret nothing. I gave the Winchesters the Colt so they could kill Lucifer. I want him dead. I am the King of Crossroads. I want this sky and this earth and the freedom to roam without subject to the rule of a being who only know of the world through a cage and freedom through chains. Angels are tricksters. Before you protest, consider how effectively you tricked me and tricked everyone along your journey. Consider, too, how well the angels tricked you that you don't remember any of this.”

Revelation, when it came, was apocalyptic by definition. All revelations were secrets, sanctified beyond the veil where God's Will reside. What Crowley said to Castiel was not a revelation. There was nothing holy in words from a demon and thus nothing holy in the fact that Castiel had forgotten what he did. However, that moment with Crowley, facing Castiel and the sharp end of a sword still faintly stained with the blood of angels, may still all be part of some sort of awful ineffable plan merely because it was allowed to happen.

Castiel, his mind and body labored by guilt, blood, and incipient humanity, would never remember what he had forgotten, but he could still be curious and this time, he did not plan return to Heaven to ask. That had been the mistake last time.

“If you care for anything you've just told me, then you will find a way to help the Winchesters,” he said instead. They were what mattered, now.

“If I care to live, you mean,” Crowley commented, looking pointedly at the weapon of Heaven pressed so close to him that he could see the whites of the eyes and the sword he was holding far too firmly and purposefully.

“As you like,” said Castiel. He stepped away from the demon who gave him a mock bow before disappearing.

-=-=

"Why do you return?" Dean asked, as soft as a prayer when he saw Castiel again.

“To see you,” replied Castiel, “and know you for myself that you are still you.”

Dean laughed, drily. “Too bad I can't see you,” he said, reaching to turn on a lamp, the green and purple bruises on his face very vivid in the dim light.

Castiel frowned. He opened his mouth to speak but his sentence was broken by the touch of Dean's lips upon his, his tongue upon his, his damaged skin upon his.

“What are you then, Castiel?”

They won't live happily ever after, or perhaps they will. Castiel didn't know because he was neither prophet nor angel. And worst and most gloriously of all, he didn't care as the loosening of the fabric around his neck, the unbuttoning of a bloodied shirt, then the divestment of all the attire of James Novak merged with his reverence for the most terrible commandments.

Castiel was less than he was, having become merely a paraphrase of himself- a mind in a body with a terrible will to live and to preserve all that mattered to him. He knew now, that courts of archangels had convened for them and the stories he heard as rumors were echoes of himself. He had chosen even as he was chosen to raise the Righteous Man from Perdition, to turn back on Heaven for him. It would have to be enough. He let his thoughts drift- a thousand stories to match the thousand eyes he knew watching him. He was Castiel, the thought, the will, the light, the soldier, the shadow and the flesh from God- reconstructed except he had never been destroyed, turned from Heaven for a man for whom he had already descended into Hell. What more?

The precarious moment, quite sudden and quite devastating in importance, was nothing like Hell and nothing like Heaven. They swallowed the sounds the other made. Devoid of fear, there was only reckless joy, infinitely refined and a glimpse made infinitely precious for its briefness.

Gradually, he was dimly aware that in the distance, the sun had risen, the light peeking through the dirty windows of Bobby's house. In a moment, Sam would clatter down the stairs, but Dean was facing him, deliberately close. Castiel could see their breaths mingling in the small measure of space between them. There were secrets there neither knew but the whole world was quiet...

"I am as you are," Castiel confessed, though he knew the question had already been forgotten. He pressed Dean's hand to his chest where the meat was thin above the sternum and where the wound had stopped healing. It still stung a little. He gasped at the pressure. Dean's eyes widened at the sound. He made to withdraw his hand but Castiel held on. He could feel Dean's pulse on his wrist against his skin, a cauterizing warmth. “Everything is all right," he promised.

They would not mention the future.

-=-=

FIN

And so completely did I imagine you  
that late last night,  
as my lamp went out—I let it go out on purpose—  
it seemed you came into my room,  
it seemed you stood there in front of me, looking just as you would have  
in conquered Alexandria,  
pale and weary, ideal in your grief,  
still hoping they might take pity on you,  
those scum who whispered: “Too many Caesars.”

 

\- _Kaisarion_ by C.P Cavafy tr. by Edmund Keeley/Philip Sherrard


End file.
